On 22 January 1972, the 11thEast Bengal Regiment was shifted to Khulna. As a Sepoy of the Regiment I also accompanied the battalion. We went to Khulna bya steamer (what is known as a Rocket Service) from Sadarghat.
Rocket Steamer
I was with the 11 Bengal until 6 April 1972. As I had joined 11thEast Bengal on 8 December 1971, I became a regular member (a Sepoy) of the regiment. I was given a discharge certificate signed by Lt. Nasir Uddin, who was the Adjutant of the battalion at that time. I also received a “Freedom Fighter” certificate issued by the regiment. My name in this certificate is written as “Sepoy Shahzaman Mozumder.”
Prior to my discharge from the regiment, I had to deposit my Chinese SMG (AK-47) to the regimental armory. I handed over the 7.62 Chinese Pistol to Maj. Matin, the official and rightful owner of it.
On 11 April 1972, I want to Dinajpur. On the 12th, I talked to many local people to find out the whereabouts of the dead bodies of my mother and brother. I came to know that the dead bodies were dumped in a ditch under a jackfruit tree in our house. On the 13th, exactly one year after their gruesome massacre, I dug out the skeletons with the help of some laborers. The skull and other parts were identified and separated based on shape and size of the bones. I wrapped them in white funeral cloths and called a Moulavi from the local mosque. A small crowd had already assembled and we prayed Janaja and buried them under the jackfruit tree—their final resting place. I left Dinajpur the following day.
I had no close relatives inDhaka. Fortunately, a distant relative, the sister of my eldest brother-in-law was kind enough to offer me temporary shelter, which I accepted.
I went back to college in 1972. Later in 1972, my brother and sisters’ families could come back from Pakistan and the surviving members of the family were reunited.
After the battle of Akahura the strategy of the Joint Forces changed. When the battle for Ashuganj was in progress on the 9th, allied forces were being helicoptered across the river and they dashed toward Dhaka. Instead of attacking the Pakistani hardened defenses located mostly on the major towns, the strategy became to surround and bypass them. The 11th East Bengal Regiment was given the responsibility to contain the Pakistanis at Bhairab.
A massive search of Ashuganj was undertaken. We found only a large number of corpses but not any live Pakistanis. I saw a mass grave of Pakistani soldiers near the Power Station’s officer’s quarters, in a small park. The graves were neither properly constructed nor the dead bodies adequately buried. It seemed very similar to the mass grave I had seen at Jagannath Hall—many of the heads and legs were sticking out of the graves. The crows and dogs had not yet arrived because of the battle. But vultures had already discovered the corpses and were having a feast. What an irony of fate—did any of these soldiers and officers participate in the massacre of Jagannath Hall—who knows?
The Pakistanis artillery kept shelling us from time to time from across the river. But it was not very serious shelling; it was more on an inconvenience. At this stage of the war, the stranded Pakistanis of Bhairab Bazar had to know that the war was almost over for them. They must have been thinking of the atrocities they had committed on the Bangali people and the more they thought about it the more scared they became. They were now completely demoralized and this occasional artillery shelling seemed to me like that they were letting us know of their presence in Bhairab Bazar so that we don’t try to occupy Bhairab Bazar thinking that the Pakistanis had deserted Bhairab.
Maj. Matin had setup the battalion headquarters in a vacant officer’s quarter of the power station. These apartment type buildings were quite sturdy and could withstand even a direct hit by artillery shells. Compared to the position behind a wall at Akhaura, the current protection was like living inside an iron-fortress—while inside the building I did not even flinch when the Pakistanis shelled us.
The advancing forces left us an artillery observer and there were two medium artillery guns somewhere to our rear to provide us with artillery support. Our daily activities included taking a suitable position behind a wall near the riverbank and using a binocular try to spot any Pakistani movement on the Bhairab side of the river and direct artillery fire on the Pakistanis. Likewise, the Pakistanis also from time to time shelled us. It was great fun particularly when we saw the shells directed by us hit the Pakistani targets.
This is how we remained in Ashuganj until we heard of the Pakistani surrender on 16 December 1971. It is impossible to express the feeling of how I felt at the news of Pakistani Surrender. We became ecstatic; we were jubilant; we became children, firing our weapons in the air as if it was a toy; we hugged and embraced each other; we danced in wild celebrations; our joys knew no bounds; our country was finally free and independent and we finally defeated the brutal, savage, murderous, and bloodthirsty Pakistanis.
We, however, could not immediately leave Ashuganj and remained there until the 22nd. As the Meghna Bridge was blown up, we travelled to Narshingdi by boat. A train was waiting for us at the Narshingdi Railway Station and we came to Dhaka the same afternoon by train.
The Vikarunnessa Noon School was assigned to our troops and the adjacent Maghbazar Preparatory School was assigned to the officers.
When we reached Dhaka, the initial euphoria and celebrations of finally becoming an independent nation had somewhat subsided. I saw many well fed people brandishing a variety of weapons with a red cloth tied to their forehead everywhere. They identified themselves as the crack-platoon–the freedom fighters of Dhaka. They had commandeered various types of vehicles and we found them speeding through Dhaka streets. We, the regular troops, exhausted from battle, the sleepless nights at the front, and mostly suffering from malnutrition, looked pale in comparison.
Were there really so many people in the crack platoons? It seemed that whoever could find an abandoned weapon of the Pakistanis now turned a freedom fighter. I discovered some of my old acquaintances of Minto Road, none of whom I could find after 25th March were now moving around with the red cloth tied to their foreheads and carrying AK-47s!
None of my immediate family was in Dhaka. Both my brother-in-laws and my brother were transferred to West Pakistan. I had not information of my eldest brother and mother who were living in Dinajpur. I, however, could find some of my college friends including the one I had met on 3 April, prior to leaving Dhaka. Though he did not carry any weapons, he was now full of bravado and proud of how ‘we’ had defeated the Pakistanis.
The Indian army was everywhere and people cheered them whenever they passed. Even though the initial wild celebrations had died down, there was a general confidence among all. After all, after a long struggle finally the Bangalis have a nation of their own. Now we can build the society based on fairness and rule of law enabling us to achieve the cherished dreams of peace, prosperity, and progress. Finally we will be able to proudly stake our rightful claim among the rank of independent nations. Time has come when all our problems will finally be resolved. This is exactly what everybody’s expectation was.
After defeating the Pakistanis, the people developed enormous confidence in the capabilities of Bangalis. The traditional divide between Hindus and Muslims seemed resolved forever. It appeared the finally the deep scar of the 1946 Hindu-Muslim riots was finally erased. Religious divide between Hindus and Muslims seemed banished permanently from the free land of the Bangalis.
The euphoric jubilations made us forget the challenges of rebuilding. Most of the national assets were destroyed; all major bridges and majority of the culverts were destroyed making communication within the country extremely difficult. The economy had come to a standstill. Many agricultural lands lay fallow. The state machinery had completely collapsed. There was no administration in the country. In the absence of administration and law enforcement, the country ruled by itself—only through the goodwill and positive attitude of the people and maybe because most people were armed.
It was a great challenge to build a nation from scratch—whoever came to power.
The fate of Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujibur Rahman remained uncertain in the Pakistani prison. Will he be able to come alive and lead the country, the dream of which he created among the Bangalis?
There was no shortage for claimant of victory. Everybody that had crossed the border now became freedom fighters. Those who had collected an abandoned weapon after the Pakistani surrender were now freedom fighters. Therefore, in the forest of millions of freedom fighters, those that had actually confronted the Pakistani Army in combat became an insignificant minority and were soon forgotten—no distinctions remained once victory was achieved.
On 24 December, Maj. Matin and I were coming from somewhere in a jeep and had stopped at the intersection in front of Scouts Bhaban (the Scouts Bhaban was not there at that time) when another car stopped by the side of our vehicle. I was in a khaki uniform and was carrying my AK-47. A gentleman shouted at me through the rolled down window of a car, “Isn’t it Shahi (my nick name, only used by family members).” I recognized him—he was Mr. Asaf Khan, a renowned businessman during the 70s and 80s and an acquaintance of my brother-in-law. He shouted through the car’s rear window, “Do you know that your brother-in-law was transferred to Pakistan?” Without waiting for my answer, he continued, “Do you know about your mother and brother in Dinajpur? Do you know that they had been killed by the Pakistani Army?” Before I could respond, the traffic signal turned to green and both the vehicles started moving.
I kept on sitting on the jeep, my brain unable to process all the data immediately. Maj. Matin was looking at me; I could discern his grieving eyes. I did not have any reaction. It seemed to me as the most natural thing. I could cry for Rafiq but I could not cry for my mother or brother.
Meanwhile, on 6 December as we were resting in our newly erected tents in the vicinity of Agartala, another tragedy was unfolding in another part of the battlefield.
While the battle at Akhaura was taking place, the 11th East Bengal Regiment was positioned around Singarbil railway station, protecting the northernmost approaches to the Akhaura battlefield. As Akhaura fell on the 5th, 11Bengal was directed to move toward Bhramanbaria from the direction of Shahbazpur-Sarail-Ashuganj axis. Bhramanbaria was now being attacked from two directions: One from the direction of Akhaura, and the other from the direction of Shabazpur-Sarail. 11 EastBengal constituted the first attack vector.
They reached Sylhet-Bhramanbariaa road by the morning of 6 December. the Commanding Officer of Bravo (B) Company was instructed to create a roadblock at Kenabdasthi village, on the Madhabpur-Bhramanbaria road. The commandant of Bravo Company, a Captain, had reached the position by 10:00 a.m. and by 11:30 a.m. had taken by making foxholes. The road was blocked.
At 2:00 p.m., the company commander of Bravo Company was instructed by the battalion commander Maj. Nasim to move to Chandura Bridgeand take blocking position there. Accordingly, Bravo Company withdrew from Kenabdasthi and “tactically[1]’ started moving toward Chandura. I have picked the term “tactically” from the explanation the Company Commander of Bravo Company has provided in the 3rd edition of his book written after the war.
To execute Maj. Nasim’s order, any sensible and responsible commander would have first kept a platoon-sized roadblock at Kenabdasthi, and then move to the new position with the remaining troops. After reaching the new position, he would have constructed a new roadblock and only then remove the roadblock at Kenabdasthi.
But the Bravo Company commander did not do that. He moved ‘tactically.” Unfortunately, in his book he did not elaborate what he meant by tactical moves when his responsibility remained protecting the remaining elements of the battalion from unexpected attacks from the rear. I am sure Maj. Nasim did not deem it necessary to explain such a basic tactics to an ‘experienced’ Company Commander.
Moreover, given that the distance from Kenabdasthi to Chandura is only 1.5 miles, even if the Company Commander had chased the Pakistanis through the road, he might have been able to save some of the people.
Col. Shafiullah describes the incident in his book as follows:
Quote
At about 1:00 p.m., I reached Paik Para with my runner. Lt. Nazrul’s company (C Company) was efficiently marching ahead of us. The battalion headquarters staff was 1000 yards behind me. This is when I met Maj. Nasim who was accompanied by eight people.
The Pakistani contingent had left Chandura for Shahbazpur and we wanted to capture the Shahbazpur Bridge before the Pakistan Army could destroy the bridge in an effort to delay our advance.
The moment we reached Islampur, a truck suddenly appeared in our rear. The color of the truck was identical to the color of 11 East Bengal trucks. Seeing the trucks Maj. Nasim commented, “Sir, Sector 3 troops must have captured Teliapara.” It should be mentioned that the Sector troops were positioned across the border in India, just opposite Teliapara. Therefore, it was not possible for our troops to come through this road unless they had captured Teliapara. Moreover, we were not expecting any Pakistani vehicles because the Captain (the company commander of Delta Company) had sent information that he had blocked the road around Chandura.
As the truck approached us, I signaled the truck to stop. The truck screeched to a stop. It was beyond our imagination that Pakistani troops could be in the truck. But, they were glaring at us! There were about 14 to 15 soldiers in the truck. They were also equally surprised and disappointed by our presence. It was quite strange for a defeated army to glare the way they were glaring at us.
Map 4: The top map shows the location and sequence of events, while the bottom diagram shows the exact location (shaded blue) of the incident. Notice the water by the side of the road.
The sudden appearance of the Pakistani truck created a dramatic situation. As the victorious side, I asked them to raise their hands and surrender. As we were fewer in numbers, some of them followed our command and raised their hands while others jumped from the truck and ran toward the village, wildly firing their weapons. A huge Pakistani Subedar was sitting at the front seat of the truck. He jumped and caught hold of me and a scuffle ensued. I was least expecting such an encounter.
Our forward company, in the direction of Shahbazpur, was about a mile from our position. The rest of the troops in the direction of Pikepara were also about 700 yards from us.
The enemy appeared to the inhabitants of the North West Frontier Province—they were Pathan soldiers and the Subedar was quite tough. It was becoming quite difficult to tackle him. Both of us had Pistols in our holsters, but none could draw them. My runner Sepoy Mannan was trying to aim his SMG at the Subedar, but he was unable to fix his aim because we were tussling with each other; sometimes I was in front of the barrel and the next moment it was the Subedar. Consequently, in the fear of shooting me, Mannan could not press the SMG trigger.
At this time, Maj. Nasim was hit in the buttocks and was seriously injured. My runner Mannan was shot in the knee. After a while, using the techniques of boxing and Judo, I hit the Subedar in the groin and made him release his grip on me. Mustering all my strength, I punched him in his face and he was flung on the ground. Meanwhile, as injured Mannan was lying on the ground, very quickly the Subedar turned, went behind Mannan, and took control of his SMG. The Subedar, holding Mannan as a shield, started shooting at me from Mannan’s SMG-I was only yards away, the bullets could not have missed. Interestingly, beyond the sound of shooting, I felt nothing. One of our troops came running and tried to shoot the Subedar but he could not because the Subedar was using Mannan as a shield. Finding no alternatives, I snatched the rifle from the soldier and started hitting the Subedar in the head—he fell on the ground. I kept on pounding his head until he was senseless—I thought I might have killed him
All these happened in a few minutes and I was the only witness in this drama. I noticed that I was all alone. Two of my soldiers were dead, Maj. Nasim was seriously injured and bleeding profusely;, I felt helpless.
The company that was in front of us, having heard the shooting, was coming toward us. The troops at the rear were also advancing cautiously. But before any of them could reach us another truck carrying about 25 Pakistani troops stopped in our rear. When they were dismounting from the truck, I aimed my rifle at them and immediately I realized that like the Subedar’s head, the rifle had the same fate—it was broken. My SMG was with Mannan and he had crawled to safety along with it. Finally, like clutching the last straw, I tried to draw my pistol; that also did not work as two of the bullets the Subedar had fired at me hit the pistol and shattered it. I holstered my savior. Finding no other alternatives, I jumped into the swamp, submerging the entire body into the mud, and remained hidden there.
The Pakistani soldiers, after dismounting from the bus, some entered the village while others tried to hide in the same swamp where I was hiding. They were wearing grey militia shirts and khaki trousers. I was wearing an olive green uniform and the mud had transformed the olive green into khaki—it was a perfect disguise. Suddenly I realized I was among the enemy soldiers. None of our troops was in the vicinity. Now I was truly helpless. I realized that it was impossible to even conceive of coming out alive from such a predicament. I prayed to Allah that He does not give me such a disgraceful death. If death must come, let it come—I want to die fighting with a weapon in my hand.
Unquote
After that, Lt. Col. Shafiullah boldly emerged from the swamp, mud all over his uniform, and without any hesitation started walking toward the village. The Pakistanis hiding in the mud probably thought that he was one of them and did not shoot.
The above is what Lt. Col. Shafiullah wrote in his book (the Bangla version) about the incident. In a single incident the battalion lost its commanding officer, the medical officer, and a number of other ranks.
As Maj. Nasim became indisposed due to injury, Capt. Bhuiyan became the senior most officer of the battalion and should have been the normal replacement for Maj. Nasim. Lt. Col. Shafiullah did not want to handover the battalion’s command to an irresponsible and callous officer. He immediately summoned for Maj. Matin and asked him to take command of the battalion.
On 7 December, Maj. Matin took over the command of 11th East Bengal Regiment near Madhabpur. I accompanied him.
The four company commanders of the battalion until 6 December were:
Alfa (A) Company: 2/Lt. Abul Hossain
Bravo (B) Company: Capt. Subid Ali Bhuiyan
Charlie © Company: 2/Lt. Nazrul Islam
Delta (D) Company: Lt. Nasir Uddin
Besides, Capt. Aziz-Ur-Rahman joined the regiment with Maj. Matin and took the command of Alfa Company.
[1] I took the term “tactically” from Subid Ali Bhuiyan’s own book.
When on 7th December Maj. Matin left to take over command of 11 Bengal, he handed over command to the senior most JCO. Later Capt. Ejaz took over command of this company. For unknown reasons, the Pakistanis did not put a fight to defend Bhramanbaria and it fell to the joint forces without a fight.
It seemed that the allied forces battle plan changed immediately after the fall of Akhaura. The original plan was-that after the capture of Akhaura—to move left towards Chittagong and capture as much territory as possible on the south of Meghna river. However, the rapid collapse of the Pakistani defenses created the opportunity to go for Dhaka, which was not the original plan.
PT 76 Tank
Therefore, immediately after the fall of Akhaura,18 Rajput Rifles was directed to proceed to Ashuganj and capture the Meghna bridge there (Bhairab bridge). Accordingly, by 8 December 18 Rajput Rifles had congregated at Tajpur from where on the 9th Morning they started to advance toward Ashuganj in an attempt to capture the Meghna bridge.
On the morning of 9 December, Maj. Matin and I were coming to inspect our forward elements at Durgapur. Our small group included Maj. Matin’s runner Mujib, a wireless operator, and another person, a local guide. Maj. Matin had met Col Shafiullah at around 9 a.m., and after the meeting, he wanted to inspect the forward areas of the battalion. Our small group was heading cross-country following the Sarail-Ashuganj road. We were about 100 meters to the left of the road when we found elements of 10 Bihar in front of us. They seemed to be heading toward Ashuganj. I saw the Indian tanks in the distance, heading toward Ashuganj. We decided to follow the troops of 10 Bihar.
While at Col. Shafiullah’s headquarters we heard rumors that the Pakistani Army had withdrawn from Ashuganj to Bhairab Bazar. This perception hardened as the Pakistanis were occasionally shelling Ashuganj and even firing Heavy Machine Guns from Bhairab Bazar, located across the river.
On 9th morning, Delta (D) Company of 11 Bengal under the command of Lt. Nasir took defensive positions in foxholes at Durgapur. Durgapur is a village about 2 miles from Ashuganj and approximately a mile from the banks of the Meghna River.
Three Indian regiments were moving toward Ashuganj: 18 Rajput Rifles moving from east to west from Tejpur along the bank of the Meghna River; 4 Bihar moving in a south-eastern direction; and 4 Guards moving South to North along the Talshahar-Ashuganj railway lines, as shown in the map below:
Ashuganj Battlefield, 9 December 1971. Shows the deployment of forces.
Meanwhile, the leading elements of 18 Rajput saw some retreating ESCAP elements and started chasing them and quickly got entangled in a firefight with some Pakistani elements firing from the protection of hardened bunkers near the rail embankment close to the Meghna Bridge. Soon more Pakistani bunkers joined the fray and put the lead elements of 18 Rajput in trouble. During this time 18 Rajput suffered few causalities including the company commander of Alpha company, Maj. Tasrem Lal Sharma would be martyred later the same day.
The Bravo Company of 18 Rajput, under command of Maj. Sisodia tried to move past Alpha Company and got himself entangled with a company of Pakistani 12 Azad Kashmir operating from hardened bunkers and got pinned down there. Maj. Sisodia himself got seriously injured in the process.
C and D companies were launched to extricate the bogged down companies and to capture the bridge and about this time (about 9:30-10:00 am) Meghan Bridge was blown up by the Pakistanis.
As this battle was continuing, Pakistani artillery now started shelling the attackers.
As Akhaura fell and the infantry was rushed to chase the Pakistanis toward the Meghna Bridge, the artillery guns needed to provide support to the troops, essential in these situations, could not cross the railway bridge over Titas River. Only two 75 mm mountain guns could cross over to support the infantry. Rest of the guns remained beyond effective range. As a result, there was no way to counter the Pakistani barrage
Air support could have been an alternative but the forward troops were operating at the extreme range of the radios and radio communications were extremely unreliable.
As these things were happening, suddenly the Indian forces realized that a full battalion of Pakistani troops were now coming toward the bridge from the directions of Bhramanbaria! What happened was that instead of a covering force defending the bridge, on the 9th the whole Pakistani brigade was on the Ashuganj side of the Meghna Bridge! This was not known and was an instance of intelligence failure. To further complicate the situation, the air support coordinator assigned to 18 Rajput was injured by a Pakistani artillery shell and became indisposed. Now 18 Rajput found itself surrounded from three sides by the Pakistanis.
Now, it was time for the Pakistanis to counterattack and 18 Rajput was now in great peril.
To start the counterattack, the Pakistanis used a tank whose engine was obviously not working as it was being pushed by a bulldozer. However, all the lethal armaments of the tanks were operating. Pakistani infantry started advancing using the tank and the bulldozer as covers. Now 18 Rajput was in deep trouble and rapidly started taking serious casualties. As soon as the 18 Rajput tried to withdrew, the Pakistanis, emboldened that they have the upper hand, started chasing the now disorganized Indian troops.
A few Pakistani jeeps with Recoilless Rifles (RCL) suddenly appeared from somewhere. The first one got a direct hit from an Indian PT 76 tank and was knocked out. However, the other RCLs very quickly knocked down three Indian PT 76 tanks in front of our eyes.
The Pakistanis, now encouraged by their initial success, came out from their hidden positions; shouting “Ya Ali,” “Ya Ali,” charged the retreating and disorganized Indians. There was complete chaos among the Indian troops. Some took position in the cover-less terrain and started shooting at the charging Pakistanis, while some others started retreating in panic. Some of the elements of 10 Bihar, after being chased by the Pakistanis, came near Lt. Nasir’s position; some of them were fleeing to his rear. Soon the left flank of the charging Pakistanis came very close to Lt. Nasir’s position and now it was time for the Pakistanis to be surprised. Lt. Nasir opened fire on the Pakistanis with one Medium Machine Gun and everything else he had, taking the Pakistanis by complete surprise. The Pakistanis, obviously, did not expect any resistance. They could see that the Indians were retreating, their remaining tank heroically trying to shelter the infantry from the Pakistanis. Now this sudden organized resistance took them by complete surprise.
106mm Recoilless Rifle (RCL
When 18 Rajput was advancing, the forward elements of 11 Bengal, one company led by Lt. Nasir, also left their foxholes and started advancing toward Ashuganj. They were to the right of 10 Bihar and the tanks, about 500 meters behind the Indian contingent. When they saw the Pakistani counterattack, they immediately retreated near Durgapur and started taking defensive positions in the foxholes dug before.
A group of Pakistani soldiers had reached too close to Nasir’s right flank and a section of the defenders panicked. Learning that the panicked soldiers were about to abandon their position, Lt. Nasir quickly moved to his right flank and was relieved to see that the platoon commander, a fresh 2nd Lt., was chasing the fickle-minded with the butt of his SMG and driving them back to the trenches. Relieved, Nasir went back to his position at the center of his company.
Chaos now ruled the charging Pakistani column. Some were crawling and trying to shoot; some others, panicked, were running aimlessly, without any apparent purpose or direction; while a few tried to assist their injured comrades, it was more like a Pakistani deje vu; total chaos.
Lt. Nasir’s Chinese Machine Gun was firing continuously and soon the barrel was glowing red from overheating, creating the danger of jamming the Machine Gun due to melted ammunition casings. Nevertheless, the Machine Gun continued to fire.
After a while, the remaining Pakistanis started retreating to their initial position behind the walls of the power station.
As soon as the Pakistanis retreated, the Pakistani artillery unleashed a vicious barrage on Lt. Nasir’s position, unnerving Lt. Nasir and forcing him to fall back about a mile and retake position there.
The battle continued until it was dark.
As the battlefield became quieter and without knowing precisely the location of our troops in the prevailing chaos, we decided to join Alfa Company, which was not far to our rear.
Maj. Matin was spending more and more time in meetings at the Sector Headquarters. It seemed that various planning activities were underway. The frequency of visits by Indian army officers increased in our camp. Also, Each time I visited the Sector Headquarters, I saw a few Indian Army officers there too. During one of these visits to the Sector HQ I was introduced to Lt. Col. Ashoke Verma, Commanding Officer of 18 Rajput Rifles.
During the month, in addition to the regular patrols, we also conducted a mortar raids on Teliapara. Mortar raids, by now, had become as common as the patrols. It was no longer something to be excited about.
We continued to receive information on various successful attacks on the Pakistani Army. It seemed that the days of the Pakistanis were rapidly nearing an end. I could feel that something was imminent—not exactly knowing what it was. The joint operations with the Indian Army were becoming frequent. In most cases, the Indian artillery was helping the Mukti Bahini in providing indirect fire support. In some cases, the Indian Army even conducted operations without direct involvement of the Mukti Bahini. By the first week of November 1971, the Indian Eastern Command had decided to permit Indian troops to conduct operations up to 10 miles (16 kilometers) inside Bangladesh territory.
On 27/28 October, the 1st East Bengal Regiment launched an attack on Dhalai but the 1st Bengal attack was repulsed by the Pakistanis. When the 1stBengal attack failed, Indian 2 Jat Regiment was ordered by Indian high command to attack Dhalai the same day. The attack was actually made the following day. Half-way, due to difficulties of terrain, the attack was aborted. Later 2 Jat and 7 Rajput Rifles (two battalions) attacked Dhalai and finally captured it on 1 November 1971. The Indians had suffered catastrophic causalities in this operation—44 dead and 89 injured.
On 20/21 November, 4/5 Gurkha Regiment successfully captured Atgram complex, one of the key Pakistani defensive positions in Sylhet.
Finally, on 29 November we came to know that the following day we will be heading for operation—I had no idea about the nature of the forthcoming mission. The entire company will take part in the attack.
The next day, on 30 November, around 9 p.m. we started for our destination in a convoy. Some Indian army Lorries were made available to us for this purpose.
About two hours later, we reached a spot, got down from the Lorries, and entered a wooded area. We were told that we are very close to the Pakistani defenses and therefore must remain absolutely silent. With our digging tools we dug trenches facing what appeared to be a ditch. As I was digging a trench with other members of our group, someone informed me that the ditch in front of us was an anti-tank ditch and that the Pakistani positions were just on the other side of it. It took us about two hours to dig our trench and take position. The gibbous moon was casting its eerie light over the landscape, rendering the entire vicinity in a kind of translucent light and haze. I could only see the small part of the ditch in front of our position but everything beyond the ditch remained a jumbled mixture of void. Our hearts pounding in apprehension, we kept sitting silently in our trenches, without knowing what to expect next. I felt the urge to smoke but smoking was strictly forbidden.
It shows the forces arrayed in the battlefield. The attack on 30 November was made by 18 Rajpur Rifles, 10 Bihar, and 4 Guards. The yellow line represents the Bangladesh-India border.
Maj. Matin was inspecting our defenses and came to our trench. He kept looking at his watch. Finally, he told me that an Indian formation would soon start an attack on Akhaura.
The calendar rolled from 30 November to December 01 and around 1:00 a.m. suddenly, without any warning, shattering the absolute stillness of the night the thunderous boom of many artillery guns engulfed the entire battlefield. I had never heard so many artillery guns firing simultaneously—the roar of the guns was stupendous. Many of the shells were flying over our heads creating the typical “whooose” noise of sub-sonic artillery shells. I later came to know that entire divisional artillery (about 72 guns of various calibers) was firing on the defenses of Akhaura. The intensive artillery barrage continued for about half an hour and then stopped.
As the Indian artillery barrage stopped, it appeared that the hell broke loose as the Indian 10 Bihar regiment attacked Akhaura. The Pakistanis now unleashed a vicious artillery attack on the Bihar regiment. Soon, the entire battlefield erupted in various types of small arms fire—Machine Guns, mortars, grenades, rifles, rockets, etc. The Pakistanis in front of us opened fire on our position. Though we could not see any enemy behind hardened cover, we also started firing with everything we had. Bihar regiment could penetrate up to three miles through the southern end of Akhaura defenses.
Indian 4 Guards followed the path created by 10 Bihar and took position behind Akhaura near the bank of the Titas River in an effort to cutoff the Pakistanis from all directions except the railway link through the Akhaura railway bridge. The bridge and its vicinity were heavily defended by the Pakistanis. They had constructed a number of reinforced concrete bunkers in this area. These bunkers running along the railway lines were so strong that even direct artillery hits could not destroy them.
The Indian 4 Guards were followed by 18 Rajput Rifles
The Akhaura railway bridge was a key objective of 4 Guards but all attempts to capture the bridge failed that night under stiff Pakistani resistance.
Map 2: This map above shows our position and Pakistani positions in front of us. Azompur station is shown as a yellow dot on the left of the map. Our trenches are shown as yellow rectangles. The location of the company headquarters can be seen as a red star on the right side of the map. Also visible are the remnants of the WWII hanger neat the company headquarters. The green shaded area used to a wooded area, however, today after 36 years, the area is heavily populated.
Azompur Railway station today
To our right was Azompur railway station; it was occupied by a platoon of Pakistani regulars. The Pakistani positions in our front were all hardened concrete bunkers and fire from these bunkers saturated our positions with devastating showers of lead. Suddenly, the Pakistanis turned the artillery guns on us and unleashed a severe artillery barrage. The most intense artillery battle of the entire war took place in Akhaura and we were in the thick of it. At least one artillery shell had landed in every square meter of our position. We were in Akhaura for six days, and for the first five days, shelling from both sides were relentless.
Meanwhile, Singarbil areas located to the north of Azompur station was attacked by 2ndBengal and was captured. This attack took place around 2:00 a.m., on 1 December.
At 5:00 am. on 1 December, Indian 73 Mountain Brigade under Brig. Tuli, supported by tanks, attacked Gangasagar, which lies about one and half miles to the south of Akhaura. The objective of this attack was to cutoff Pakistani 33 Baluch Regiment deployed at Kosbah from the main element of 27 Brigade (located at Akhaura).
Meanwhile, the main Akhaura battlefield was relatively quite during the morning of 1 December. The battle at Gangasagar again flared up as 33 Baluch, after retreating created a strong defense.
In the Akhaura battlefield, meanwhile, Pakistani 12 FF regiment, divided into small groups, took position in the hardened bunkers positioned along the railway lines. Some of these 12 FF elements were deployed in the bunker in front of us and we continued to exchange small arms fire with them. Since both were in dug in positions, these exchanges were mostly ineffective. We did not suffer any serious casualties and I believe so did our enemy.
Things quickly changed around 1:00 pm when a battalion of 57 Mountain Brigade, with tank support, attacked Akhaura. The artillery battle restarted and we ducked deep into our trenches.
I was never much bothered about small arms fire, particularly, when in a trench or a bunker. In these situations, I had an equal chance of shooting back at the enemy. However, these bloody artillery shells and mortar bombs were terrifying. When you face shelling, you are always thinking if a shell is going to land on you. This constant apprehension is probably the greatest advantage of artillery shelling. The psychological pressure is very damaging to the opponent’s morale. Whether a shell will fall on your trench or not is only a guess and a matter of luck.
During a lull in fighting, Maj. Matin and I were returning from the trenches to our Company HQ, when suddenly shelling resumed. Finding no cover in the vicinity, we ran toward the trees. I took shelter under a small tree while Maj. Matin took refuge under a tree with a huge trunk. A distance of only 10 meters separated us. When Maj. Matin saw that I had taken shelter under such a feeble tree, he looked furiously at me and unleashed his barrage of abuses at me; and between those abuses told me to take shelter under another large tree a few yards to my right. I did so. As soon as I had changed position, a shell landed just in front of the tree under which I had previously taken shelter. Though the tree remained standing, some of its branches broke from the impact of the shell’s splinters. In the middle of the shelling, Maj. Matin gave me a contemptuous glare though he may have had just saved my life.
If we were unlucky, the Pakistani defenders were unluckier. The Pakistanis had 18 105mm howitzers and about 8 120mm mortars in Akhaura. On the other hand, the Indians had the full divisional artillery consisting of 72 guns including many heavy artillery pieces. When all these 72 artillery guns fired on Akhaura, the effect was apocalyptical.
The artillery duel continued intermittently throughout the night of 01 December, while we remained without any food.
Map 3: Showing the extended battlefield of Akhaura-Bhranmanbaria-Bhairab axis. On the top left corner of the map the location of Bhairab and Ashuganj can be clearly seen. The top right of the map, Teliapara and adjacent areas are barely visible. The yellow place marks on the right side of the map are the railway stations along that route.
It became morning, 2 December 1971. Maj. Matin decided to setup the company headquarters behind a large wall. During the Second World War, Agartala Airport (its original name was Singarbil Aero dram) was constructed by the British army for providing air support to the Burma Campaign against the Japanese. Besides the runway, they also had constructed a number of aircraft hangers by the side of the airfield. Time had taken its toll and only the walls remained of the WWII aircraft hangers. We setup our company headquarters behind one of these walls. We neither constructed a bunker nor a trench—our lives depended solely on the protection offered by these thick brick walls constructed over 35 years ago. .
Maj. Matin’s reasoned that as the Pakistanis were firing mostly artillery shells, which have a flat trajectory, it was impossible for a shell to land in our position located immediately behind the wall. Yes, a shell could have hit the wall and part of the wall could have collapsed on us. However, a few bricks falling on our heads were preferable to being hit by an artillery shell. The risks appeared acceptable to us.
In the Company HQ, there were a total of three persons: Maj. Matin, his runner Mujib, and I. Since, Maj. Matin was the only officer in the company; my responsibilities were to stand for him when he was not in the HQ.
The F-86 Saber Jets of Pakistan Air force kept on attacking Akhaura since morning. The clear winter sky was full of plumes of white smoke as the Indian Anti-Aircraft guns created an effective defense against Pakistani air attacks.
From time to time, the Pakistani gunners interrupted their fire for unknown reasons. Maybe because the guns became too hot or some of the Indian artillery shells found its targets—who knows? We used these breaks to get some food and ammunition to the trenches. This was the first meal after taking position on the night of 30 November. We had not food on the 1 December.
After sunset, the entire battlefield again erupted in a fierce firefight. The battle gradually intensifying as the night progressed. Artillery shells started landing on our position like a hailstorm, while I kept praying not to become a causality of the savage shelling.
On 2 December, it was just before sunrise when I accompanied Maj. Matin to visit the trenches to find out the status of our defense and of ammunition. The ban on smoking seemed irrelevant now and we resumed smoking freely. As soon as we had finished our cigarettes, intense small arms fire erupted from our right flank. The Pakistani bunkers in front of us also joined in the shooting and so did we. The sound of firing from our right flank was increasing. Suddenly, we heard the sound of Pakistani battle cry and intense firing. We jumped into a trench.
Maj. Matin told us to keep firing at our right flank as it seemed that the 2nd Bengal had abandoned their position at the station! Maj. Matin jumped out of the trench and vanished. He came back in a few minutes with another person—Naik Golam Mowla. Mowla was apparently disgusted with the fleeing 2nd Bengal soldiers and was telling Maj. Matin that he would shoot anybody, even the 2ndBengal, if they tried to flee the battlefield. Maj. Matin was visibly alarmed and told Mowla not to do any such thing. The problem is that in a battle field when someone in front of you gets panicked and starts fleeing their assigned posts, it immediately affects the morale of the rest of the troops. They also gets panicked and starts abandoning their positions. Therefore, it is essential to motivate to calm the troops as early as possible. Sometimes, it may be necessary to take stern actions against those who try to flee. This exchange between Major Matin and Naik Mowla was taking place while intense firing was continuing. He asked Naik Mowla to immediately return to his trench and handle the situation.
He then directed us to concentrate fire on the right flank and again vanished. We were receiving fire from our front—from the Pakistani bunkers across the ditch. However, the danger from the right flank was immediate and lethal. If we allowed the Pakistanis to overrun our position — we would all die! So it became a desperate fight. There were three more trenches to my right and people from two of those trenches retreated and we could persuade some of them to remain in our trench. Some of our troops were influenced by the fleeing 2ndBengal elements and were soon lost in the darkness. But the majority of our troops remained in their positions. The new people that joined our trench were carrying two light Machine Guns. Now our trench was crammed with six people, two light Machine Guns. All of us concentrated our fire on our right flank. Rafiq, was the only person in the trench just next to ours, kept firing his 2-inch mortar. He kept popping mortar bombs as fast as he could. Pop! Pop! Pop! Boom! Boom! Boom! I think that night I permanently lost part of hearing from my left ear. One Chinese LMG was firing from my left, almost over my shoulder, the end of the barrel nearly touching my left ear.
Soon, I heard someone started firing our MG42 at the Pakistanis from a nearby trench. We had no time to look back. We had two full boxes of 7.62X39 (for Chinese SMG and Rifle) and 7.62X51 (for SLR) in our trench.
Map 4: Showing the Pakistani defenses on the northern side of Akhaura battlefield. The green shaded areas represent Pakistani bunkers. The position of 2ndEast Bengal and our positions are represented by yellow colored rectangles.
I had exhausted all the four magazines of the SMG and started to reload the magazines from the open ammunition boxes. As soon as the magazine was loaded, I started firing again. Soon the magazine was exhausted and again I reloaded the magazine. But this time I reloaded all the four magazines. We all started reloading our magazine by turn, which was not particularly easy under fire and in total darkness.
We had created such a blanket of fire that that the Pakistanis could not advance any further—they stopped. The stalemate continued for sometime until Maj. Matin reappeared from somewhere. I found Naik Mowla accompanying him carrying the MG42, two extra ammunition belts slung over his shoulders. Maj. Matin commanded us to charge the Pakistanis.
Normally, a charge is something we abhorred. It was terrifying. It required lots of training and guts, at least one of which we lacked. But it seemed that that night we had crossed the boundary of fear—after crossing the threshold of fear, you care no more. I don’t think you can call it courage because in those situations you are overflowing with adrenaline and you cannot think rationally—you simply act or react on instinct. You feel like a savage hungry beast looking for prey, someone to kill and devour. You are beyond rational. Your brain is now one track. It is kill or be killed—there is no other choice. That day we had reached that level. We climbed from our trenches and with the battle cry of “Joy Bangla,” and “Allaho Akber,” charged the Pakistanis. Were the Pakistanis surprised by the battle cry of “Allaho Akber?” Maybe they were. They considered us as Hindus. Terrified by so many terrified people screaming and charging, the Pakistanis fled and took shelter at the station they had captured from 2ndBengal. We reoccupied our previously lost forward trenches.
That day we did not win any battle but we halted the Pakistanis from breaking through our defenses and foiled their plan to attack our rear. No one can blame the soldiers of 2nd Bengal because they were also like us, mere students, farmers, laborers, smugglers, former EPRs, and a few veterans of the original 2Bengal, mostly lead by inexperienced commanders.
Our victory celebrations were short lived. The Pakistanis unleashed a savage artillery barrage on us with full vengeance,. Meanwhile, I returned to the Company HQ and was resting when a shell landed very close to me—closer than many others, but I could not see where—it made a different kind of sound, unlike anything I had heard[1] before. The shell landed within a meter of where I was crouching on the ground. A was a bright flash lighting the entire area followed by a loud bang. I thought I was dead—we all were dead. Some dirt fell on me. For sometimes I became deaf, all sound around me was muted. Is it what you feel when you are dying? Then I realized I was not dead—we were not dead. The force of the blast flung all the splinters away from us and we merely faced the shock waves of the explosion.
Our sacredness unfortunately did not stop the shelling and soon our sacredness was replaced by a kind of dreary bleakness. I was sure that I was going to die that day. After sometime, as the shelling slackened, we went to inspect the forward trenches. There were some trees in front of our position; some were blown apart littering the entire area with broken branches, twigs, and leaves. The ground all around was dotted with holes created by the impact of artillery shells. The shelling had not completely ceased, few shells were still landing. Compared to what we had faced a little earlier, it was a minor inconvenience. We became hungry but no food was available because our kitchen was located about two kilometers behind the front lines and due to the intense shelling, no food was forthcoming.
After sometime, Maj. Matin asked me to return to the Company HQ to coordinate with other platoons. He insisted that at least one of us must be at the Company HQ because it was the hub of the entire company’s activities. All the injured were first taken to Company HQ and depending on the nature of injury they were either treated by the Company medics or sent to the hospitals. Another two persons, both former civilians like me, joined as I headed for the Company HQ.
As we reached halfway, the shelling intensified. Shells started landing around us including a few that landed very close to our right. Finding no cover in the vicinity, we started running for the Company HQ; some more shells landed near us. The person who was running in front of me suddenly fell down screaming, “I am hit,” “I am hit,” “help me, help me,” The remaining two of us ran to him and found that a splinter had pierced his left thigh, made a deep gash, and blood was rushing out from the wound. I had a pressure bandage with me; immediately I wrapped the bandage around his thigh and tightened it, somewhat stemming the oozing flow. The two of us supporting him from both the sides, we struggled toward the Company HQ. As soon as we had taken a few steps, another few shells landed very close to us. To my utter amazement, I found that the seriously injured person, with his nearly severed leg, dashed for the cover of a nearby tree, almost throwing us to the ground—I could never have imagined that a seriously injured person could do that. The injured person was so scared that he forgot all pain in his desperate dash to safety. We again tried to carry him, but he would not budge from his new shelter. Meanwhile, shells kept landing among us. It was a hopeless situation. We could not leave him, this place was not safe. Moreover, if not treated soon, he might die due to loss of blood, and we had to seek appropriate shelter ourselves. In spite of his vehement protests, we forced him up from the ground and hauled him to the Company HQ. He was promptly dispatched to a hospital.
We waited a while behind the protection of our wall and ate our meager breakfast. After a short while Col Shafiullah, the S-Force Commander, came to visit our Company HQ. Excited and emotional, he embraced Maj. Matin; he was sobbing. Between sobs, he kept repeating, “Matin, you have saved my honor, you have saved the honor of S-Force.” Maj. Matin was visibly embarrassed. Politely and maintaining requisite comport he attempted to console the S-Force Commander. Soon Col. Shafiullah restrained himself and regained his composure. Meanwhile, Pakistani artillery was firing arbitrary shells and they were landing at random inside our defenses. Scanning the environs of the Company HQ, Col. Shafiullah inquired, “Where is your trench, Matin?” When Maj. Matin replied that he had no trench, Col. Shafiullah appeared puzzled, “No trench?” he inquired incredulously. How can it be? How can you survive without a trench in a battlefield that would come to be known as one of the most vicious artillery battles? Maj. Matin reassured him that the Company HQ was quite safe. He explained his reasoning. Disconcerted, Maj. Matin’s reassurance did not appear to reassure Col. Shafiullah. With obvious discomfiture, the S-Force Commander kept shaking his head. He soon left.
After breakfast, having satisfied some of our hunger, we lit cigarettes. The sound of battle became relatively quiet, occasionally interrupted by the sound of Machine Guns.
Fortunately, we could eat dry afternoon meals that day. The quietness was disturbing and appeared somehow deceptive. Suddenly, we became alarmed by the sound of aircraft. There were three aircrafts. The Indian anti-aircraft guns started throwing its lethal projectiles, which exploded in the clear blue midday sky. The jets briefly strafed on the Indian positions near Akhaura RailwayBridgeand than headed in the direction of Gangasagar. We heard the sound of anti-aircraft guns around Gangasagar and loud booms of exploding rockets fired by the jets. Half an hour later the battlefield again grew silent.
Soon the sun’s reign was over and it started to descend behind the horizon; the dying sunlight casting its yellowish death throes over the battlefield; the yellow quickly turning into purple, and finally darkness blanketed the arena, bringing back the apprehensions into our consciousness.
The battlefield remained eerily quiet until 8 pm then the Pakistanis attacked.
The artillery battle restarted; our position was again subjected to a most intense barrage. We also came under attack from the Pakistani positions around Azompur and we were again entangled in a vicious battle. The battle continued throughout the night. The Pakistanis could not gain any ground and the attack proved fruitless.
It seemed that the Pakistanis had increased the number of guns targeting us because the shelling appeared to be even more intense than what we had faced before. This time they started firing a mixture of ground-bursts and airbursts. As a protection from airbursts, some of our people had improvised their shelters by caving the walls of their trenches. This small cave like holes allowed them to hide their head and part of the body from being exposed to airbursts. However, these holes had also created the possibility of the trenches caving in by a direct hit or even by an artillery shell landing nearby. Despite, our troops considered protecting themselves from airbursts a priority and accepted the possibility of caving in as the lesser evil. .
The shelling and shooting continued until 11:00 p.m. Then it became quite—very quiet. Maj. Matin and I headed to inspect the trenches located at the front, near Azompur station. I was looking around, a lighted cigarette loosely dangling from the corner of my lips. Some more trees had fallen and some more branches littered the landscape. Then my gaze shifted to a trench in front of me—the 2-inch mortar -man Rafiq’s trench. I could not believe my eyes. Rafiq’s trench was a D-shaped trench; a trench constructed for the 2-inch mortar. In the dark, the trench looked strange. The trench looked wider and irregular. Ominous premonitions automatically ejected the cigarette from my lips. I took a few involuntary steps toward the trench and became frozen by the sight. Where was Rafiq? Oh! My God, a shell had landed just inside the trench ripping apart his entire body. It was not possible to recognize him as Rafiq. Rafiq was nearly my age and even shorter than I was. Rafiq had been in our company for some months; because a rifle was too awkward for him, he preferred the 2-inch mortar as his weapon of choice and he became quite apt in its use. He mostly kept to himself and was not very talkative, but in a battle he stood his ground and had no hesitation to confront the enemy. I admired his courage even though he chose to keep his distance from most of us. He was liked by everybody in the company not because he was probably the youngest but for his cold courage. A few more people came to the trench. I could not move. I could not speak. For the first time in 1971, I cried silently. I could not control my crying. I did not even try to touch him; I could not touch the deformed humanity that used to be a courageous boy soldier named Rafiq. I could not touch him—it was not Rafiq. I kept on crying. When we buried him, I was still crying. I was crying when we came back to the trench after his janaja. Even today, when I am alone, I sometimes cry over him.
At 4:00 a.m. (it was already 3 December), when Major Matin woke me up. Without realizing I had fallen asleep in the middle of an artillery battle! The constant sleep deprivation and consistent anguish had dulled and numbed my senses and frankly I did not much care even if a shell had landed on me. The smell of death and destruction was all around us. Each day some of our comrades were dying. By now I had resigned to my fate and made peace with death. If death must come, it was not unwelcome. I only prayed that if I must die in this battlefield, it should be either through a direct hit by an artillery shell or by a bullet through some vital organ so that I don’t have to suffer the ignominy of a cripple. I intensely disliked the idea of a hospital bed with various bandages and tubes protruding from everywhere, I vividly remembered the state of Dula Mia at the Agartala Hospital and I did not want to face his fate.
Maj. Matin’s shove brought me back from my reverie to the world of those standing in the boundary of life and death. He informed me that we would soon be participating in an attack on Azompur station. I felt much better. It was much better to die fighting than die like a cornered dog huddled in the trench. We joined the forward trenches.
Around 6:00 a.m., the Indian artillery unleashed an intense and savage barrage on Azompur railway station. The shelling continued for about 15 minutes.
Just after the shelling had ceased, 2nd East Bengal attacked Azompur from the north and we attacked from the east of the station.
Instead of charging the station, we took position behind trees and started shooting at the station. Attacked from two directions, the Pakistanis were trapped. Our MG42 and two light Machine Guns started pouring their lethal cargo of death and destruction over the Pakistani position.
Soon, the Pakistani fire from the station stopped for a moment. Suddenly, we started receiving LMG fire from our left, from the direction of Akhaura. Turning left, we noticed that some Pakistani reinforcements were trying to come through the railway tracks. Immediately, the MG42 was positioned to cover the railway tracks and started firing, while the two LMGs continued targeting the station.
The passage through the railway tracks was quite narrow. As the MG42 covered this narrow track, not a single Pakistani could come near the station. The Pakistanis fled from the station and soon 2nd East Bengal occupied the station.
After the station was reoccupied, we returned to our trenches and expectedly, the artillery barrage on our position resumed. The artillery shelling continued sporadically throughout the night but the Pakistanis did not dare to again attack that night.
On 3 December, at 6:00 p.m., Pakistan air force started a surprise attack from West Pakistan against the Indian air force but this attack was largely unsuccessful.
On the same day, immediately after the preemptive strike by Pakistani air force, India declared formal war against Pakistan and the Indian air force was unleashed on the night of 3 December. In a single night, the Indian air force flew over 500 sorties, and after that, we never saw Pakistan jets over our skies.
During a lull in the battle, I, along with Maj. Matin went to visit the recaptured Azompur station. I looked around the station and noticed a few new trenches were now adorning the station. I also noticed a rocket launcher in a trench overlooking what appeared to be a small bridge. Lt. Badiuzzaman explained that the Pakistanis had tanks. The rocket launcher was positioned there to stop Pakistani tanks if they used them. The position looked well protected to me. We had reasons to be concerned with Lt. Badiuzzaman’s position because we were acutely aware that the only way the Pakistanis can attack us, they will have to come through Badiuzzaman’s defenses. It was quite difficult for the Pakistanis to attack us through the anti-tank ditch because we would have butchered them in the ditch, which had a mine-field and was a death trap for infantry. We were also similarly constrained in attacking the Pakistani position through the ditch.
As evening was approaching, we returned to our position. Another group had already left to collect our supper but that supper would never arrive. After about an hour, Lt. Badiuzzaman came to our Company HQ. He looked rather troubled. Maj. Matin, a little annoyed, inquired of him what he was doing in our HQ leaving his position. Now, he looked seriously troubled. Maj. Matin was sternly staring at him. Hesitating to speak, Badiuzzaman finally spoke. He requested Maj. Matin to go with him to his position and help him to settle down the troops. He said that his troops were showing signs that they might abandon the defenses.
Hearing this, Maj. Matin became furious. “What, you call yourself an officer?” He challenged Badiuzzaman. Poor Badiuzzaman kept looking at his feet. Maj. Matin did not stop. When Maj. Matin was angry, as I had indicated before, he could unleash a barrage of sarcastic abuses. I felt that Badiuzzaman really needed help. I interceded and started reasoning with Maj. Matin. I said, “Matin Bhai, he needs your help. His position is also critical to us. If his troops fled during the night, we will be in deep trouble. Please help him.” Maj. Matin started glaring at me. He was furious that I dared to interrupt him while he was addressing another officer. I thought he was going to target me with his abuses. Fortunately, he did not. He probably agreed with my reasoning. He cooled down and agreed to accompany Badiuzzaman. Before leaving with Badiuzzaman, Maj. Matin instructed me to remain in the Company HQ and stand for him. Slinging their respective SMGs they left.
He came back after an hour and half and informed me that everything was in order. He had given a pep talk to Badiuzzaman’s troops and assured them that we would come to their assistance if they were under attack.
Battle, as usual, continued throughout the night of 3 December. In our position, the Pakistanis kept on shelling on and off, which by now had become a regular phenomenon. Therefore, we accepted the shelling with a kind of philosophical indifference. Now, I could even sleep during intense shelling!
It was the morning on 4 December. The time was around 4:30 or 5 a.m. when Pakistani 12 FF and a part of Azad Kashmir regiment counterattacked all across the front. Fierce fighting again erupted all over the battlefield.
Some of the Pakistani troops tried to attack us through the railway tracks; however, effective fire from an MMG stopped that attempt.
The Pakistani counterattack achieved little.
As the battle slackened, we received terrible news. Lt. Badiuzzaman, who was leading the defense of Azompur station died during the night while trying to encourage, motivate, and rally his troops during the Pakistani attack. An artillery shell had landed just in front of him and a number of splinters had fatally injured him.
He died shortly, before Maj. Matin and I went to see him after sunrise. He was still carrying the packet of Panama cigarettes in his pocket I had given him the previous night.
Akhaura fell on 5 December 1971. Most of the surviving Pakistani regulars of 12 Frontier Force and 12 Azad Kashmir, as well as 33 Baluch from Kasbah, tried to retreat toward Bhramanbaria. Some succeeded while many were captured by the angry villagers and were lynched. We remained in our position for sometime and then entered Akhaura to mop up any stragglers.
We found a few and arrested them. I particularly remember one, a frail looking youth of about 20 or 21. What caught my attention were his eyes, big scared eyes in a hollow black socket. He was shivering in fear. I felt sorry for him. He had endured one of the most intense shelling for five days. He, probably, like us, did not have any sleep for five days; probably he did not eat anything. He was crouching in the ground. Someone kicked his head and he feebly tried to protect his head with both hands. Now terrified, his face completely distorted in fear as our troops tried to pour all their vengeance on this poor fellow. I stepped forward and protected him from any further abuse. I helped him up and led him to our trenches.
The battle of Akhaura was finally over. In five days 18 of our comrades perished in the battlefield. Another 25 were injured, some of them seriously.
Shortly after, we left our trenches. In a single column, we crossed Agartala airport and entered Agartala town—it was actually the suburbs.
An incredible spectacle was before us. On both sides of the road, it seemed that the entire population of Agartala had assembled. They were shouting and cheering “Joy Bangla, Joy Bangla.” They had with them all sorts of food and drink. Some carried water, some green coconuts, some bananas, and some had even made tea. They were offering us all these food. They were hugging us. They were kissing a few. Men, women, children, old people, young people, toddlers, Hindus, Muslims, Christians, Buddhist, everybody was there.
I must also add that the Pakistani artillery did not spare the population of Agartala. They became frequent targets of Pakistani artillery shelling. The destruction caused by shelling was clearly visible everywhere. I could see many buildings partly destroyed by artillery shelling. Many innocent civilians had also died in these attacks, and they died for us, for the Bangalis. How could we ever pay for their sacrifice?
After walking for about 5 kilometers, we reached a location where our advance party had already erected a number of tents. We were so exhausted by hunger, tension, and sleep depravation that most all of us, just after entering the tent, fell asleep. In the back of our mind, we knew that the war had just started and more adventures awaited us in the coming days.
[1] Later I discovered that it was a dude, i.e., the shell did note explode.
From the very beginning of November a new sense of urgency was noticeable all around. The Mukti Bahini’s attack across all sectors not only intensified but each day we also heard news of successful attacks by the Mukti Bahini.
During the first week of November, we again visited Agartala. As winter was knocking at the door, I purchased a cotton blanket because the army issue blankets were too rough and coarse.
On the afternoon of 20 November, Maj. Matin asked Rafiq, Pathan and me to accompany him. While we were in the Jeep heading for the destination he told us that we were going to a recently liberated place called Mukundupur. Mukundupur is a railway station between Akhaura and Montola and was defended by a platoon of Pakistani regulars and Rajakers. Mukundupur was attacked and captured by a joint operation by two companies of Indian 18 Rajput Rifles and a company of 2nd East Bengal led by 2/Lt. Sayeed.
After reaching Mukundupur, we entered and inspected the area. When we arrived the Indian troops had already departed. The local liberators enthusiastically narrated the intricacies of the attack and described the stiff resistance they faced from the defenders. It was an important victory for the Mukti Bahini.
Map showing the location of Mukundupur Railway Station. The yellow line represents the Bangladesh-India border.
However, what caught my attention was a captured weapon. I had never seen another like it before or since. It looked like an Air Gun but had a straight magazine. Its caliber was 9mm. It was some sort of Sub Machine Gun. After the war, through some research I found out that it was an Italian Beretta Model 3842. It must have been a remnant of the WWII arsenal.
Two or three days after we had visited Mukundupur, one day as I was cleaning my weapons, an Indian Border Security Force (BSF) patrol came to our camp. They had with them a person, a bare footed civilian dressed in a lungi[1] and shirt. The BSF told me that he was a Pakistani spy and had confessed of stashing some weapons including explosives near the Bangladesh-India border—inside Bangladesh territory. The BSF needed a volunteer to go inside Bangladesh and retrieve the weapons. Maj. Matin was not in the camp at that time.
We knew that there were many Pakistani spies around us and it was nearly impossible for us to identify them because there were so many refugees in the border areas. It was quite easy for the enemy spies to mingle with the refugees. I also suspect that some of the volunteers that came to be trained as Mukti Bahini may have been Pakistani agents.
In fact, these spies used to plant anti-tank mines in our area and, in one incident, a tractor carrying seven to eight Mukti Bahini had fallen victim to these mines and died.
As I had already finished cleaning my weapons and having nothing else to do at that time, I volunteered to assist them.
I would take this opportunity to give a brief description of the BSF in 1971. I found them to be most pathetically armed. They were equipped with WWII vintage Lee Enfield .303 rifles, .303 Light Machine Guns, Sten Guns, and a few water-cooled Vickers .303 Medium Machine Guns. The Mukti Bahini was much better equipped than them. I think one of the reasons for such poor equipment was that the East Pakistan Rifles were also similarly armed in 1971 and there was a kind of reciprocity in the armaments of both the border security paramilitary forces. I have not seen the BSF for many years, but I am certain that today they would be equipped primarily with Indian SLR rifles because the Bangladesh Rifles are currently equipped with Chinese 7.62 equipment.
Coming back to my story, I found that the BSF contingent was about 20 persons strong. Beside their .303 rifles, they had a .303 LMG. I also noticed that one of the .303 rifles had a cup-shaped grenade launcher mounted at the end of the barrel. This was the first time I saw a Lee Enfield .303 with a grenade launcher.
After walking a while we reached the road where a BSF lorry was parked. We boarded the lorry and headed in the direction of Montola. On the way to Montola, there was a BSF base on the left side of the road about two miles from our base camp. We crossed the BSF base and after another ten minutes stopped near the border. I did not recognize the location, it was somewhere between the BSF base and our Sector Headquarters at Montola. Dismounting from the lorry, we headed for the Bangladesh-India border, which was about 500 meters from the road. Accompanied by BSF and the ‘spy,’ soon I reached the border.
As we reached the pillar demarking the Bangladesh-India border, the BSF commander, a middle-aged mustached JCO in a jungle hat, told me in a mixture of Bangla and Hindi that the BSF could not go inside Bangladesh territory and that I will have to take the ‘spy’ inside the border and retrieve the cache of weapons. He also pointed to a cluster of trees in the distance and cautioned me that it was a Pakistani BOP[2]. ”We will take position here and give you covering fire if needed,” he assured me.
I prodded the ‘spy’ with the barrel of my SMG indicating that he should move. Now alone with him, I closely inspected the person. He was a lanky person, I guessed he was about 30-32, unshaven for three or four days, and with deep set eyes that appeared expressionless. I asked him his name. He muttered something which I did not understand. I asked him whether he was really a Pakistani spy. He kept looking at me with a blank stare. I asked him again, this time sternly. He claimed he was not. The BSF did not tell me how this person was arrested. I knew nothing about him. I asked him where he had stashed his weapons. He pointed toward a cluster of trees in the distance. I told him to move and show me where it was. We started moving in the direction of the Pakistani BOP, which was about another 500 meters from the border.
In 1971, the border areas were mostly deserted as most of the civilians had fled from their houses. Therefore, the only people one could expect to find here were Pakistanis, their cronies, or us. The terrain consisted of uncultivated paddy fields, occasional cluster of trees, and abandoned houses surrounded by an assortment of trees and shrubs.
After walking for about 15 minutes, we reached a cluster of trees. Beyond the trees were paddy fields extending for about 200 meters followed by a large pond, and beyond the pond lay the Pakistani BOP.
I was becoming suspicious about this person. He seemed to be gradually dragging me toward the Pakistani BOP. After reaching the cluster of trees, I again asked him about the location. He ambiguously pointed toward some trees near the middle of the paddy field. I was not willing to venture so close to the Pakistani BOP. These trees were my last protection against Pakistani small arms fire. I was hesitating whether I should ask him to fetch the weapons or take him back to the BSF. I decided to let him go alone. I warned him that I will be behind the tree with my SMG trained on him and if he tried to do anything funny, I would shoot him. The person did not reply and seemed to be quite unconcerned as he walked slowly toward the trees.
As he was only a few yards from the trees, he committed the fatal mistake of his life—he started running toward the BOP. He probably did not know that I was a good marksman. The person was running, shouting, and waving his hand to attract attention of the Pakistanis. The trees were nearly 100 meters from me and he had dashed maybe another 25 meters beyond the trees. The Pakistani BOP was another 200 meterss from the running figure.
My SMG was in selective fire mode, i.e., in single shot mode. I was well aware that with full automatic fire I would not be able to control my aim. I aimed carefully—very carefully. I gently squeezed the trigger; “tash;” missed with the first shot. I stopped breathing, readjusted my aim, and very calmly squeezed the trigger a second time and almost simultaneously the Pakistanis opened fire on him. It looked like the running person suddenly stumbled into something. He almost somersaulted and rolled into the ground. Some bullets also hit the trees behind which I was standing.
I did not know where my bullet had hit him but I clearly saw his body shudder at the repeated impact of Pakistani bullets. Using the cover of the cluster of trees, I headed toward the border where the BSF were supposed to have taken position.
When I reached the border, I did not find any BSF personnel. As I was looking around for them, I spotted them about 400 meters insideIndian Territory, all cringing on the ground. I asked the commander why they had taken position so deep insideIndia and he replied that they did not find adequate cover near the border!
Anyway, I narrated had happened. The BSF commander seemed unhappy that I could not recover the arms cache. I shrugged my shoulders. The commander kept grumbling as we headed back to the BSF base.
During October it seemed that many changes were taking place. Two new battalions under S Force were being formed and they were undergoing training. Now, there were two types of organization. The first were the Battalions under S Force, and the rest were sector troops under the sector command. Our company led by Maj. Matin was in sector troops. The sector commander was also changed. Capt. Nuruzzaman became the new sector commander of Sector 3, while Major Shafiullah became the commander of S Force. S Force had two regular battalions: the Second East Bengal Regiment (2 Bengal) and the newly raised 11 East Bengal Regiment (11 Bengal).
Smith & Wesson .38 Service Revolver
Both 2 Bengal and 11 Bengal were formed by splitting the remnants of the original 2nd East Bengal Regiment. The shortage of junior officers was supplemented by injecting officers from the first batch of freshly commissioned Bangladesh Army officers, who had just finished training. The shortage of troops was filled by recruiting from the pool of sector troops. Therefore, most of these fresh regiments contained both veterans and new injects; significantly compromising the battle effectiveness of these battalions.
We continued our regular patrols and occasional mortar raids. However, it felt like something was in the air. Maj. Matin was being frequently summoned to the Sector Headquarters. Occasionally, I used to accompany him but mostly he went alone, accompanied by his runner. I sensed that some serious business was underway.
One day as I was cleaning and oiling my pistol in the proximity of Subedar Mannan, he inquired if I knew how to use a pistol. Taking exception at his snide and desiring to restore my hurt ego, I challenged him to a contest. He smiled and accepted the challenge. I reassembled the pistol while he collected his revolver from his tent and we went to a nearby hillock. We improvised a target by shaping an empty cigarette packet and measuring twenty paces, we fixed the distance. Subedar Mannan invited me to shoot first. My confidence was founded on my proven skills with a rifle and I believed that using a pistol should be a similar skill. I took out the pistol from my improvised holster, pulled the slides to cock the pistol and took careful aim at the target, about the size of 4 square inches, only 20 paces from me.
I fired and missed. Embarrassed, I took careful aim, took the second shot and missed again. Now, chagrined and distressed by two consecutive misses, I became nervous. I continued firing and each miss weakening my self esteem—all eight shots missed the target. Completely embarrassed, my dignity shattered, and feeling ashamed at my haughtiness, I could not look straight at Subedar Mannan. How could I have missed a target at only 20 paces? I was so ashamed. Feeling my embarrassment, Subedar Mannan came near me and patted my shoulder but said nothing. Slowly he removed his .38 caliber Smith & Wesson revolver from its canvas holster, which he was carrying in his hand. Holding the pistol in his hand, he told me softly that shooting a pistol properly is a difficult thing and one needs lots of practice. “I was once a very good shot with a pistol but not sure how good I am today,” he added. He extended his arm toward the target, drew back the hammer, took aim, and fired. The first shot barely missed the target. He readjusted his aim and fired again. This time the bullet pierced the target just in the middle. He stopped firing and turned to me, saying, “I can teach you what I know about a pistol but you will have to practice if you want to be a good pistol shooter.” I nodded my consent to be a good student.
Throughout the month, Subedar Mannan taught me the secrets of the handgun. In that month alone, I must have fired at least 500 rounds at the target. I became obsessed with it. The good thing was that I became a reasonably accomplished pistol marksman and I could hit the target at 20 paces consistently with very few misses. I also need to confess that I never had the opportunity to use the pistol in any combat. The AK-47 was the weapon of choice for those occasions.
One day, a patrol went near Teliapara and lobbed a few grenades in a pond. The explosions stunned a number of big fishes and they came out floating on the water. I think they caught about 10-12 large fish, mostly Ruhi and Katla. The same evening the fish was cooked and we had a fabulous feast. The EPR had really good chefs and they knew the art of cooking. The fish was delicious. Sometimes, even after 36 years, I can still feel and smell the taste of that sumptuous meal with fish.
I remember another occasion; it may have been the Eid day, when the EPR chefs prepared 13 different dishes of dried fish (shutki). I think the idea was Subedar Mujib’s, who I suspect was a gourmet. What impressed me even more was the presentation of the 13 dishes. As we did not have proper serving bowls, they improvised them by hollowing out various types of fruits and vegetables, e.g., eggplants, pineapples, papayas, gourds, pumpkins, etc.
October was a relatively quiet month for us.
We entered the month of September 1971.
I don’t remember clearly and I could be mistaken, I believe Capt. Matin was promoted to the rank of Major about this time.
On the first day of September Maj. Matin called a war council and informed us that the following day the entire company will take part in an operation. We would enterBangladesh territory and take part in an operation in support of an attack. Everybody was asked to be ready by 8:00 p.m., when the company would start for the mission.
The entire fighting force of the company was assembled—about 70 people. All armed to the teeth. We had with us 12 LMGs and our MG42. The rest carried various types of automatics.
Even though it was only three days to full moon, the overcast sky made the night pitch-dark when we started from our base. It was raining somewhere nearby because a moist and cool breeze was touching us with its gentle embrace. We could see flashes of distant lightning. As we reached the road, I found three trucks were waiting for us. We boarded the truck and soon the trucks started rolling toward our Sector Headquarters at Montola. The trucks were moving slowly, the headlights piercing the darkness of the night and illuminating only a small part of the road while the rest of the universe remained hidden in a mysterious dark blanket of the unknown.
Some section of this stretch of road ran very close to the Bangladesh-India border and any headlights became clearly visible from the Pakistani positions across the border. Consequently, the headlights were switched off and it became about impossible to see the road in front of us. Even in total darkness the trucks continued to snail through the tortuous road. After about an hour, we stopped somewhere and dismounted from the truck. It seemed that we were somewhere near the Bangladesh-India border because I saw a group of BSF personnel nearby.
We crossed the border and headed for our objective. After a while I thought we had reached a road; but coming closer I found it to be a railway track. We crossed the railway track and started walking until we reached a road. We dug some foxholes on both sides of the road and took position. Our task was to block the movement of all Pakistanis through this road.
Suddenly, it started to rain and it not only drenched us but our foxholes were also getting waterlogged. The rain increased into a heavy downpour. The temperature dropped and it became extremely cold. I was shivering in the extreme cold and dampness; I suddenly had the urge to smoke but unfortunately we were under orders not to smoke. Moreover, my cigarettes and matchbox must have been completely drenched by now.
Completely soaked in rain, we kept sitting in our waterlogged foxholes in the night’s pitch darkness, occasionally illuminated by lightning bolts. I was becoming cold—so cold that I could not remain inside the deluged foxhole—I came out of it. I was freezing; I was becoming hypothermic, my teeth started an uncontrollable chatter; I was shivering from cold even though it was only the beginning of September.
I don’t know how long we sat there but suddenly we heard the sound of artillery coming from somewhere behind us. About 10 minutes later, the shelling intensified and it seemed that an artillery dual was in progress. Moments later, we heard distant sound of various types of small arms fire.
As the battle was raging somewhere behind us, in the distance we saw the headlights of approaching vehicles. We could see three sets of headlights. It continued to pour like cats and dogs, and the headlights, reflecting on the rain, created a kind of opaque and misty glow, like mysterious beasts approaching us in the pitch darkness of the night. My body suddenly seemed to warm up a bit. I reentered the waterlogged foxhole. Half of my body inside the foxhole was under water. Maj. Matin, who was in the foxhole next to mine got out of his foxhole and vanished in the darkness. He went to visit the other foxholes and instruct them not to fire until the vehicles reached within about 150 meters from us. He came back shortly after and reoccupied his foxhole. The vehicles continued slowly to come toward us. The din of battle to our rear was increasing while we kept patiently waiting for the Pakistani vehicles to approach within the grasp of our weapons. Suddenly, I was not feeling cold anymore.
We did not make any foxhole on the road itself. Our foxholes were on either sides of the road—about 35 on both sides. Twelve LMGs and one MG42 plus various automatics—a lethal reception awaited the Pakistani vehicles.
It was obvious that the Pakistani vehicles contained the reinforcements for the battle that was raging some distance behind us.
The first vehicle, a Pakistani Army Jeep, came within range. The person next to Maj. Matin was manning the MG42. My finger was firmly on the trigger and I had about pulled it a quarter. Maj. Matin asked not to fire—we waited for the first vehicle to come nearer. The first vehicle reached within 100 meters of the MG42 when Maj. Matin gave order to fire. The MG42 started spewing volleys of angry lead at the jeep and so did I. All seventy of us started firing our weapons at the three Pakistani vehicles.
By now, both sides of the road were deluged in knee-deep water. However, soon the Pakistanis recovered, regrouped, and started firing at us. The headlights of all the vehicles but one were destroyed. One headlight of the last truck was still glowing allowing us to see the rear of the second truck. On the other hand, the Pakistanis, in the darkness and pouring and blinding rain, could not see us. The only thing they probably saw were the muzzle flashes of our weapons as they hurled deadly lead at the barbarians. There were occasional flashes of lightning illuminating the entire battlefield and offering momentary glimpses of the enemy. The enemy had also blended with darkness.
I was firing my SMG in short bursts, not more than 2-3 rounds per squeeze. Aiming was really impossible because now the targets were invisible. A truck and the jeep were partially visible but firing at them was futile because nobody was inside those vehicles anymore. The Pakistanis appeared to have taken shelter behind the vehicles and the slope of the road. The heavy downpour combined with the pitch darkness had reduced visibility to a few meters. The battle continued in this manner for 10-15 minutes.
Suddenly, we saw the last Pakistani truck, its remaining headlight no longer glowing, trying to go backwards. This truck was the furthest from us. It was still about 300 meters from us and it was the least damaged of the three vehicles. We tried to shoot but somehow it managed to continue to reverse and soon was no longer visible in the darkness. It seemed that the Pakistanis had retreated. The fire from them became erratic and soon there were no fire from them. We also stopped firing.
Since our task was to block the road and stop any Pakistani attempts at reinforcing the battle to in our rear, we remained in our foxholes. I had already finished two out of the four magazines and started reloading the empty magazines with the extra ammunition I was carrying in the pouch. Meanwhile, we braced for further enemy attempts at reinforcement.
The din of battle behind us continued for another half an hour’s and then gradually died down. The Pakistanis did not send another convoy at us. We left our position just before dawn and headed back to the Bangladesh-India border. The ground through which we came during the night was now completely flooded—it looked like a river. All the paddy fields and surrounding areas were now submerged and in some places the water was about chest deep and we almost waded back to safety.
After we returned to the camp, I came to know that we were supporting an attack on a Pakistani position called Dharmagar. Our attack failed.
Around the first week of September, three new persons joined our company. The first was a 25-26 years old, short, curly haired, and talkative person. He was a Chatra League (student wing of Awami League) worker and also a former Vice President of Bhairab College Student Union. His name was Jasim. The other two were Rafiqul Islam (Rafiq) and Nurul Islam Pathan (Pathan), both aged between 18 and 20, and both from the district of Kishorganj. A new tent was erected for the newcomers and I also moved with them in the new tent.
As the members of our company constituted mostly by EPRs and rural youths, I hardly had the opportunity to forge close bonds with the rest of my fellow comrades. The members of the EPR mostly kept to themselves, while I had little in common with the rural youths of our company. The newcomers allowed me, for the first time, to forge some close bonds with my fellow fighters.
Soon, I discovered that Jasim was more of a politician than a fighter. He was very timid and shy of any encounters. He was more intent on sharing his political exploits and his connections.
The other two, Rafiq and Pathan were close to my age and easy to forge bond with, both were also extremely courageous and looked forward to a good fight with the Pakistanis. Both Rafiq and Pathan were students ofKishoreganjCollegeand were pre-acquainted with each other.
Our new tent was adequately commodious to accommodate the four of us. It had a raised bamboo platform that we used as a bed at night. Our meager possessions included a change of cloths—I had two trousers, two shirts, a lungi, two blankets, two pairs of socks, a pair of jungle boots, and a gamcha. Rafiq and Pathan had identical belongings in addition to a small bag to carry them. For our meals, we had metal plates and mugs.
Pathan was not only courageous but I also noticed he also enjoyed exaggerating his accomplishments. Rafiq, on the other hand, was more matured and composed. Both Rafiq and I enjoyed Pathan’s braggadocio and his hyper-ness.
Around this time, I felt that our strategy was gradually changing. The regular battalions were being formed. Selim Bhai and his brother Anis had already left for officers training. We were also gearing up for direct confrontations with the enemy. One day we came to know that we would be attacking a Pakistani Border Observation Post (BOP) near the Indian BOP of Montola. The Pakistani BOP was located about a kilometer from the Bangladesh-India border. Our entire company became ready for the attack.
We had the three mortars and three machine guns, and all these weapons would be used in the attack. The mortars were positioned inside Montola teagarden. We learned that an Indian field artillery battery[1] would be providing us supporting fire prior to the attack. This was the first Indian artillery support our company received in 1971.
After sunset, we gathered near the Indian BOP. The entire company was participating in the attack. Between the Indian BOP and Pakistani BOP, the ground was mostly uncultivated paddy fields, now covered with tall grass, paddy stubble, and ankle deep water. The Pakistani BOP was on a raised ground and defended with bunkers and concrete walls. We positioned the two Checz machine guns some distance from the road about 400 meters from the BOP, while we carried the ineluctable MG42 with us.
The artillery guns and the mortars opened fire and soon shells started to fall around the Pakistani BOP; under cover of the shelling, we stealthily started advancing toward the enemy. The shelling stopped after ten minutes and by then we had reached within 200 yards from the objective. As soon as the shelling ceased, with our battle cry of Joy Bangla we started our attack; the machine guns opened fire and we started to run toward the BOP. Soon we discovered the difficulty of attempting to move rapidly through the inundated paddy fields. Many of us kept repeatedly stumbling in the slippery and sticky mud. The Pakistanis opened fire from their well-defended position. We continued running at the enemy, shouting at the top of our voices and managed to reach within 150 meters of the target. The Pakistanis, firing from the cover of the bunkers and thick walls, caught us in crossfire. Many fell in the paddy fields; our machine guns were bought forward; it was difficult to find a suitable location to place them in the soft muddy ground. Nevertheless, somehow the machineguns started firing at the enemy bunkers. We also had the rocket launcher but we could not get close enough to use them effectively. There was no cover in the paddy fields. The attack was turning to be a fiasco and any hopes of capturing the BOP quickly evaporated. Maj. Matin had to stop the attack and direct everybody to fall back on the road. To make matters worse, the Pakistani artillery now joined the fray and started shelling us. We took a number of casualties and with much difficulty, fell back on the road. The attack was a complete fiasco. Attacking a well-defended position through a flooded paddy field without any cover was a stupid idea. Later, Maj. Matin told me that the attack was the idea of Sector Headquarters. Apparently, we were being trained in frontal attacks against a well-defended enemy as a preparation for upcoming events.
Around this time Dula Mia, who was now in a different company, was seriously injured in an encounter. The incident, which I came to know later, was something like this:
A platoon-sized force of Mukti Bahini went inside Bangladesh to patrol and got entangled in a skirmish with an enemy patrol. As they were engaged in a firefight, another Pakistani patrol attacked the Mukti Bahini from the flanks and the Mukti Bahini was almost encircled. Dula Mia, who was operating a Chinese LMG, alone took a stand against the Pakistanis and started providing covering fire under which the rest of the platoon gradually retreated to safety. In the process, Dula Mia had received bullet injuries in the leg. Now completely encircled from all sides, he took position in a ditch and continued firing at the Pakistanis. Next, he received multiple bullet injuries in the abdomen. After tying his abdomen with his Gamcha; he continued to engage the Pakistanis. He was again hit in the thigh and even that did not stop daredevil Dula Mia’s deadly fire. Meanwhile, the rest of the platoon came out to safety. This incident was taking place over a period of three hours. When the sector commander was informed that Dula Mia was trapped, he himself went to assist him. Using the sector’s 3-inch mortars to provide covering fire, another two platoons finally rescued fatally injured Dula Mia from the ditch from where he continued to fire at the Pakistanis encircling him.
Dula Mia was later admitted to Agartala Hospital.
One day, Maj. Matin and I planned to visit Dula Mia at the hospital. We went to Agartala Hospital and met him. His entire body was bandaged; various tubes snaked through his mouth and nose. He looked extremely delicate and weak. His eyes brightened when he saw us; it was obvious that he was very happy. It was very difficult for him to speak. We kept sitting by his bed holding his palm. After a while we left Dula Mia after promising to visit him again.
As we were coming out, Maj. Matin stopped in front of another bed. I saw a bearded man clutching praying beads (Tosbi) occupying the bed. He did not appear to be injured. Maj. Matin asked him how he was feeling and he replied that he was not well; his chest pain was becoming severe. After some additional pleasantries, we left him.
As an anecdote I cannot resist the temptation of narrating another incident that took place much later. This second incident occurred when Gen. Ziaur Rahman was the Chief Marshall Law Administrator and Maj. Matin, then Lt. Col. Matin was the Commanding Officer (CO) of President’s Guard Regiment (PGR). Even though, Lt. Col. Harun (Later Maj. Gen. Harun) was the first official CO of PGR, the battalion was actually raised by Lt. Col. Matin. The CO used to reside in a first floor room at the Bangabhaban. I was sometimes visiting Bangabhaban at that time.
One day, as we were coming down, suddenly Ziaur Rahman came out with his entourage. He was going somewhere. Lt. Col. Matin greeted him, Ziaur Rahman, apparently in a hurry, returned the greeting curtly, but did not stop. Trailing Ziaur Rahman, were another group of officers. One of them, a suave Colonel swinging a baton whose both ends were gilded, stopped and snapped, “Hello, Matin, how are you?” After some exchanges of pleasantries, he left. After the urbane colonel had left, Lt. Col. Matin turned to me and asked, “Zaman, have you recognized him?” To be honest, I had no clue about the Colonel’s identity. I do not remember meeting such a smart and dashing colonel before. A grin appeared in the corner of CO’s mouth. He challenged me, “are you sure you have not recognized him?” Now I was dumbfounded. He was definitely not from our sector. I started searching my memory archives—how could I have missed such an impressive person when today’s brief encounter had imprinted his image permanently in my cerebrum. I finally surrendered. Seeing my obvious discomfort, Lt. Col. Matin came to my rescue. “Do you remember when we went to visit Dula Mia at the Agartala Hospital?” After my nodding, he continued, “do you remember we stopped in front of another bed and exchanged greetings with a bearded gentleman with a heart complaint?” I again agreed by nodding. He concluded, “It is the same person, he is Col. Nurul Islam Shisu.” I was now overwhelmed. What a metamorphosis. The person in theAgartala Hospital bed had looked so fragile and timid. On the other hand, this smart colonel was a symbol of courage and vitality, a model army officer who would be emulated by many younger officers. God’s creations are indeed full of surprise and mystery.
During the month of September, for the first time our camp became the target of Pakistani artillery.
It was when the sun had just went down in the horizon and our supper was about to be served, we heard the distant boom of artillery guns. Initially we did not attach much importance to those sounds—various types of sound were routine. Suddenly we heard the fearsome ‘whoooose” noise—the typical noise created by sub-sonic artillery shells flying overhead. Before we could take cover, the shells landed somewhere outside our camp’s perimeter, among the trees. I grabbed my SMG and ammunition belt and dashed for the perimeter trench. It was obvious that the Pakistani gunners knew our location; however, we were not sure if they had a spotter nearby. The next two shells landed very close to the cluster of tents—barely missing them and dispelling any notion of random shelling—there was somebody directing the artillery fire from a nearby position. Fortunately, by this time everybody had taken shelter in the perimeter trench, which surrounded the camp. When that shells started landing inside the perimeter, we were convinced that a spotter was directing the shelling from a nearby location. In the darkness it was almost impossible to find the location of the spotter. More shells landed amongst us, the splinters ripping apart some of the tents.
Soon the shelling stopped. We remained in the trench for sometime expecting an assault, which did not come. Soon we came back to inspect the damages. Nobody was injured. Some of the splinter from one of the exploding shells had ripped part of a tent but as the poles were undamaged, the tent kept standing. There was no other damage even though four shells had landed inside the perimeter. A few patrols went out to scour the vicinity to find the enemy artillery spotter but they could not find anybody suspicious.
We felt the need for bunkers with overhead protection, a few of which would be dug over the next few days. Logs topped with two feet of earth reinforced the bunkers—we felt secured.
During the end of September, we planned a raid on Teliapara Railway station, which was defended by a platoon of Pakistani regulars plus assortments of Rajakers. The entire company would take part in the attack.
Our mortar platoon was not exclusively ours. The Sector Headquarter often used them for various purposes, as and when required. Six persons staffed the platoon. Among them were Syed Abdul Hannan, a student of Arts College; Abdur Rahim, a village doctor; Md. Nurul Islam, a college student; and Havilder Abdul Aziz of 2nd East Bengal Regiment. Hav. Abdul Aziz was the commander of the mortar platoon. Unfortunately, I do not remember the names of the other two.
The plan included Indian artillery barrage on the Pakistani gun positions located at Jagadishpur teagarden and another barrage on the Teliapara railway station, while our three mortars would take part in bombing Teliapara railway station only because our mortars did not have adequate range to engage Jagadishpur—the location of enemy artillery..
A section was deployed around the Teliapara bamboo bushes to protect our right flank.
The success of the raid depended largely on our ability to silence the Pakistani artillery located at Jagadishpur teagarden. If we could silence these two guns located there, our chances of success would be very high.
Just after sunset, our company crossed Bangladesh-India border, keeping the bamboo bushes to our right. After making some foxholes, a section took position facing the bamboo bushes.
We carried all three of our machine guns for the raid. It was already dark and we proceeded toward the target in darkness. Teliapara railway station is approximately two kilometers from the border. Soon, under cover of darkness and undetected by the enemy, we reached within 400 meters of the station. The defenses of the station included some bunkers and a barbed wire fence surrounding the entire station. Outside the barbed wire fence was sharp bamboo panjis (stakes) and anti-personal mines. We carried a few improvised Bangalore Torpedoes for creating paths through the minefield. In the cover of darkness, we positioned the Machine Guns on two flanks at a distance of 400 meters from the station. We had an Indian artillery spotter (observer) with a walky-talky. His job was to provide target information to the Indian gunners. Two platoons would take part in the raid; one platoon, minus one section, would remain as reserves.
The artillery barrage started. A battery of Indian 105 Howitzers started firing. At the beginning, three guns were targeting the Pakistani gun position at Jagadishpur while the other three pounded the railway station.
Our three mortars also started discharging its lethal cargo upon the station. The first salvo over the station overshot the target by about 75 meters but the next round of shells landed on the station. The shelling continued for sometimes while we waited, arrayed in a single file for the barrage to stop. The guns stopped after about ten minutes and as soon as the shelling stopped, the machine guns opened fire from the flanks and all of us, shouting our battle cry of “Joy Bangla”, started the attack. Almost simultaneously, the Pakistani defenders also started to fire at us. As the Pakistani fired, some of us crouched while others lay down on the ground. The fire from Pakistani automatics, some with tracer rounds lighted the entire night. We were still 200 meters from the target. We identified the locations of two LMGs and one Machine Gun of the enemy and Maj. Matin assigned objectives to the sections. Our machine gun continued to fire from the flanks; some bullets going over our heads. Crawling, we started advancing and our lead elements reached the bamboo stakes/mines barrier.
We continued to fire at the station from our almost exposed position and in return we were taking casualties-some unfortunately fatal. Meanwhile, the torpedoes were positioned and exploded with a loud bang, quite distinct even in the din of battle. The explosion cleared an 8-feet wide path through the stakes and minefield. The rocket launcher fired a rocked into a bunker and the enemy LMG stopped firing from the bunker. We continued pressing our attack.
Maj. Matin was directing the battle taking position in a depression in the ground. I was next to him, firing small burst at the bunker to our right. The only cover we had from the concentrated enemy fire was the random unevenness of the ground, which barely allowed us to evade the Pakistani bullets. Fighting like this we reached 150 meters from the target and this was the time to sally.
Suddenly Maj. Matin stood up from the ground. Bullets were flying everywhere. I hesitated because I was afraid. When Maj. Matin stood up for the charge, I was stuck by his courage. Bullets were zipping everywhere and it takes enormous courage, commitment, and leadership qualities to stand up ignoring the possibility of imminent death. First he stood and did not make any motion and then suddenly roaring the battle cry and swinging his SMG in a semi-circle, he shouted, “Joy Bangla! Joy Bangla! Advance! Advance!” Almost everybody stood up. A few got hit by enemy bullets and fell down but that failed to stop us, we started firing and running toward the station.
There was a deafening explosion from the bunker 50 meters to my right; glancing, I noticed a rocket had partly destroyed the bunker; the fire from within stopped for a few seconds and then resumed. The rocket could not completely destroy the reinforced concrete bunker! No wonder, most of our rockets were of high explosive types, which detonated on impact—we needed armor piercing rockets for destroying reinforced concrete bunkers.
Now we found ourselves in an imbroglio; while some of us had advanced through the gaps created in the minefield by the torpedoes, others could not advance due to the panjee stakes and minefield. Our attack became disorganized and was faltering. Those that had advanced through the gaps were now being trapped. For unknown reasons, some of the torpedoes did not explode and we failed to create adequate routs through the minefield. We should have anticipated this possibility and brought more torpedoes to clear a few more paths through the minefield. Now, we had no alternatives but to retreat. Maj. Matin directed to concentrate fire on the three bunkers in front of us and under this covering fire we somehow crawled back to safety.
We had six wounded and one dead; we carried them back to our camp.
Given our objective was a raid; our retreat was not uncalled for. It seemed that we could have even captured the station if the artillery shells could have softened the Pakistani defenses more thoroughly and some of our improvised Bangalore Torpedoes did not fail to explode at the last moment.
Later, after coming back to the camp we checked some of the unused explosives and they worked perfectly. I wonder what had happened, why some of the torpedoes failed to explode. It is possible that the operators became too nervous under fire and forgot to do the right things.
[1] An artillery battery has six artillery guns.
It was the height of the rainy season when July rolled to August. Now, it was always either pouring or drizzling. One day in early August as we were patrolling near the Teliapara railway station, suddenly a thunderstorm started. Quickly, we took shelter under a nearby tree to protect ourselves from the gigantic raindrops that accompanied the thunderstorm. Unfortunately, the tree was neither large enough nor its foliage adequately dense to stop the invading raindrops.
Meanwhile, the thunderstorm intensified around us; the entire sky was alive with a thousand flashes; sound of terrifying lightning bolts kept us in constant awe and apprehension; we were mesmerized by the dreadful beauty of a thousand flashes all around us in a breathtaking way. The ground between the Teliapara teagarden and the railway station was mostly empty except for some bushes and minor trees like the one we were using as a shelter—with one exception; there was a huge tall tree (Shimul or silk-cotton tree) about a thousand yards from us and this was the largest tree in the vicinity. As we were witnessing the breathless magnificence of thousands of flashes all around us, suddenly, a massive thunderbolt hit the tree; an intense flash momentarily blinded us and immediately followed by a tremendously deafening explosion—like hundred artillery shells exploding simultaneously, and immediately the tree caught fire and started burning like a gigantic torch. I had never seen anything like this and it is difficult to express the frighteningly wonderful experience in words.
During the middle of August it was again time to lay mines in theDhaka-Sylhet Highway near Satchari teagarden. We took the ‘friendly’ ravine, which by now had become a well-traveled route for us. Even though we had a number of encounters in this area, the Pakistanis appear not to have discovered the ravine—our secret highway through Satchari. It was probably not surprising because the ravine was well camouflaged by thick jungles and unless someone knew the exact location of the entrances, it was impossible to detect. Moreover, both sides of the ravine were protected by impassable thick undergrowth and, therefore, equally undetectable from the sides.
Shortly, we reached the metallic road. There was a small culvert close by which we had previously blown up when Teliapara was in our control. It now seemed that the enemy had repaired the culvert by laying some metal plates and then topping the plates with earth, creating an ideal spot for us to plant mines. Instead of three anti-tank mines, which was our usual number, we laid two because there was not enough room for three mines in the narrow culvert. After laying the mines, we laid in ambush for a few hours until it was dark but unfortunately nothing came our way that day. Disappointed, we left for our base.
The thick yellow line shows our “highway” through Satchari Teagarden. It was a nala is shown in yellow color (hilly creek) leading to the old Dhaka-Sylhet road (in blue color). The culvert is on the top left of the image.
We came back the next morning. Reaching the culvert, we found it was partly destroyed and to our joy—a three ton truck, completely burned–was lying on the ditch under the culvert. As the ditch was quite shallow, we could easily inspect the mutilated three-ton truck. The missing left rear wheel suggested that the mines exploded when the rear wheel fell on the mines and the powerful blast had flung the wheel somewhere in the jungle. Also, the metal plate which was used to repair the culvert had directed the full explosive force upwards, similar to the principle of a shaped charge. Considering that we had used only two mines, the resulting damage was impressive. The truck was completely destroyed. We found few blood stained shirts and helmets and a completely burnt Chinese 7.62 rifle without its wooded stock. However, we did not find any corpses probably because the Pakistanis might have removed the dead and injured during the night. We also did not hear the explosion from our camp and I reasoned that the thick vegetation of the jungle had absorbed most of the sound waves and did not allow it to carry a long distance.
We took the destroyed rifle and a few blood stained helmets as souvenir and headed for base.
A few days later, we again decided to lay mines on the same culvert. We followed the same route through the ravine and reached near the road. It was around 5:30 p.m. There were 21 persons in our group—all adequately armed with various automatics. Having reached the vicinity of the road, we decided to reconnoiter the area. Capt. Matin, a former Ansar Adjutant by the name of Sayedur Rahman, and I climbed up to the Dhaka-Sylhet metallic road—I distinctly remember it was near milestone 81. This area was familiar to us as we frequented this area on a regular basis. The culvert, our target, was located some 700 yards from Milestone 81.
The ravine was on the left side of the road while the right side contained steep hillocks covered with trees and various types of bushes. The space in between the hillocks was covered with thick impenetrable bushes and occasional patches of tall elephant grass. The road meandered through these two landscapes restricted visibility to about 150 yards. The three of us were carelessly walking toward the culvert, our weapons dangling from the shoulders. About halfway to the culvert, we found a Jam (Jambolan or Syzygium cumini Skeels) tree on the right side of the road; some broken branches were lying on the ground, some still with fruits in them. The tree was not very tall and some of the low branches, now full of ripe fruits, were within our reach. I plucked some of the berries, ate some and stuffed some in my ammunition pouch. The other two also did the same.
Though the sky was overcast from the beginning, now it started to drizzle very lightly; we resumed walking toward the culvert and soon reached a small patch of sand—actually it was a trail from the teagarden connecting the Dhaka-Sylhet road—a few boot impressions on the sand immediately caught our attention. Even more alarming was that the impressions were fresh—there was no trace of raindrops inside the footprints. All three of us were inspecting the footprints and reached the same conclusion but before we could speak, we heard footsteps and excited conversations approaching us from the direction of the culvert, which was about 200 yards from us, around a bend.
We all turned toward the intruders and noticed an enemy patrol was just becoming visible as it turned the corner, now about 150 yards from us—the enemies saw each other almost at the same time. We hurriedly crossed the road and the moment we started running toward our patrol in the ravine, the enemy started shooting at us. The bullets were flying all around us, some were flying over our heads, some were hitting the road, some hit the grass, some cut the grass at our feet with that peculiar “zip-zip” so well remembered by the soldier who has passed the ordeal of a battle. We kept running through the narrow road and somehow all the bullets missing us even at such a close range. The sun was already setting behind the hillocks and in the twilight we must have been a difficult target to an enemy who was also running. I wanted to turn back and shoot at the enemy, but the distance was too short for turning and there was no cover. On my left, I had a steep hill, which made climbing impossible; on the right was the ravine but the possibility of jumping on the ravine was blocked by trees and thick bushes. I kept close to the curve of the hill as the road snaked left and twice I got entangled with the undergrowth and fell down and this may have saved my life. The other two were just in front of me—all running toward the waiting patrol. The hill suddenly ended and I saw a patch of tall elephant grass on my left. Glancing back, I saw that the Pakistanis were just beyond the corner—acting on pure instinct, I jumped into the patch of elephant grass, turned back toward the road and hunkered down; only about 5 yards from the road; the tall elephant grass completely hid me from the road. I heard the Pakistanis pass by me still firing at the other two, who kept on running. I think that they suspected someone was nearby because they fired a few bursts from their automatics in the elephant grass but they could not have imagined that someone could be so close to the road. They also threw a hand grenade, which landed in the adjacent jungle about twenty feet from where I was, exploded, but none of the splinters touched me. I remained motionless where I sat; I could hear the Pakistani soldiers a few feet from me, excitedly arguing the whereabouts of the fugitives.
Encounter location: The culvert is on the top left of the image. On the right you can see the location of the Pakistani patrol and a little distance on the right our location. The location of our waiting patrol is on the bottom right of the image.
The Pakistanis loitered around the road, talking excitedly and sometimes taking potshots at the jungle. After about an hour, I did not hear them anymore. I kept sitting inside the patch of elephant grass. After sometime, silently, I laid down in the grass, the SMG by my side. Various thoughts ran through my mind; I was sure that Capt. Matin and the Adjutant had safely joined our waiting patrol. I was wondering what they were doing: were they waiting for me? Meanwhile, I also faced a minor crisis: A hoard of menacing mosquitoes soon started flying over my head and I became apprehensive that the dark column they had formed over me may reveal my position to the enemy. In the stillness of the night, various scattered thoughts started invading me. I was thinking about my brothers and sisters in Dhaka—what were they doing now? The images of my mother and brother living in Dinajpur raced through my mind. The memory of some of my friends in Dhaka and Dinajpur flashed through. In spite of my efforts to be calm, the memories of earthly pleasures, and friends, and home were overwhelming me, causing me at intervals to break into wild paroxysms of anguish. I was also thinking of how to get out of this mess. I could not risk getting out of the elephant grass at night because I had no idea where the Pakistanis were. They could have been waiting somewhere nearby. Moreover, in the darkness our own people might have shot me by mistake. The moon came out and I could see the silvery moon-rays over the dark jungle, creating a kind of mysterious ambiance with light and shadows. Various apprehensions kept popping up from time to time and I tried my best to control my apprehensions. I remained in this condition for about two hours and then gradually the exhaustion of the day made me surrender to the blissful embrace of slumber.
I woke up before daybreak and cautiously peered through the grass. It was about pre-dawn and from my position, only five yards from the road, I could clearly see the road just in front of me. Suddenly, I noticed a Pakistani soldier standing silently by the side of the road. I kept looking at him from my hidden position. He was in khakis and I could clearly discern his helmet. He kept standing there without the slightest of movements—as though he were a statue. The light was getting brighter, but still the enemy did not move an inch! As the light intensified, suddenly it dawned on me that it was not an enemy soldier—it was a sapling planted by the side of the road inside a round and tall bamboo enclosure. What I mistook for a helmet was the top part of the sapling that had curved into the shape of a helmet as it protruded from the top of the enclosure.
I cautiously came out to the road, carefully surveying both ends of the winding road—nothing, not a sound or trace of anything living other than the morning birds. Keeping by the side of the road, I headed toward the mouth of the ravine, where our patrol was stationed the previous night. As I climbed down from the road, I did not find anybody. Besides many scattered footprints on the sandy floor, there was not a trace of anybody and it appeared that everybody had returned to base. I assumed both Capt. Matin and the Adjutant had safely reached the waiting patrol, had waited for me for a while, and left without finding me. I was feeling a little heroic considering that I was the only person in the patrol that went missing and expecting that everybody in the camp was eagerly waiting for my return. I put the SMG in semi auto mode and proceeded toward the other mouth of the ravine at the Satchari end. The ravine was not straight but snaked through the jungle and in most places visibility was limited to about 50 yards. As I turned a sharp bend, suddenly I was face to face with a wild boar. It had three cubs. I knew the reputation of the wild boars, particularly with a litter. I kept looking at her; not moving a muscle, while she made some grunting noise of displeasure. Maybe she sensed that I did not pose a threat to her litter; she slowly turned and fled, the litter trailing her. I heaved a sigh of relief because I did not want to shoot and attract the enemy into the ravine. Moreover, I was not sure if I could have stopped a fully grown boar in such a close range had she decided to charge me.
Soon, I reached the end of the ravine and came out to the jungle. I squatted on the ground and tried to listen for any sounds—nothing; everything was quite except for the tweeting and flapping of the busy morning birds. The reader will remember this place as we had encountered the Pakistanis in a previous occasion. Naturally, I had to be very careful. Next, I cautiously reconnoitered the environs of the teagarden for any movements—again nothing. Very slowly and cautiously, protecting my body behind trees and bushes I entered the teagarden. Fortunately, no bullets came to greet me. Gaining in confidence that the Pakistanis were not in the garden, I headed for the stream.
As soon as I crossed the steam, I saw one of our patrols standing some distance by the bank. I was delighted to see them and assumed that they were looking for me; now beaming and with renewed vigor, I proceeded to be received and be greeted.
All my strengths sapped when a very worried Subeder Mujib inquired about the whereabouts of Captain Sahib and Adjutant Sahib. What! Were they not here? Did they not join the waiting patrol at the ravine? As they had been running in front of me, I had assumed that they had joined the waiting patrol. Now it seems that all my assumptions were wrong. How can it be? Where did they go? I did not see them when I came through the ravine. What could have happened to them? I was now feeling completely dejected, a kind of languor descending over me. I immediately volunteered to enter the jungle and search for them. The Subedar dissuaded me. He asked me to return to the base and take rest. He assured me that a permanent patrol will be posted at Satchari for their return.
I returned to the camp and discovered that my entire body was covered with leeches and my garments were all soaked in blood. I removed the leeches from various parts of the body; burned a piece of cotton rag and applied the cotton ashes over the bleeding bite marks. After cleaning and changing my clothes, I was restless and at times, I was blaming myself for not looking for them in the morning. Soon I joined the patrol that was leaving to relieve the other patrol that was already at Satchari.
Entering the teagarden we found our patrol sitting under a large tree. I wanted to take the patrol to go through the ravine to the Dhaka-Sylhet Highway, but Subedar Mannan was not willing to do so. We took position at the mouth of the ravine.
We waited with anxiety and trepidation, expecting them to emerge from the jungle at any moment. But alas, nothing happened—there was no sign of the captain or the adjutant.
The second day was almost going to be similar until around 4:00 pm., when we saw the Ansar Adjutant emerge through the mouth of the ravine. He was completely exhausted and collapsed on the ground immediately after he saw us. He was gasping and panting with exhaustion. We offered him some water, which he gulped down. After sometime, as his panting subsided and after gaining enough strength to speak, he told us that he and Capt. Matin was separated a short time after they entered the jungle from the road and did not see each other since. He was clueless about the whereabouts of Capt. Matin. Until now, he also thought that he himself was the only person missing.
Everybody was asking him questions, “Where have you been?” “What happened?” “Why are you panting?” “Where is Capt. Matin?”
He narrated that after entering the jungle, briefly Capt. Matin and he were together. They thought that I had been hit by enemy bullets and had fallen down. Both were asking the other about me. Capt. Matin had started cautiously calling out my name but there was no response from the dark jungle. Suddenly, Capt. Matin thought that he saw a human outline—some human movement–some distance in the jungle and thought it was I. Capt. Matin asked the Ansar Adjutant and he seemed to concur with him—yes, he also saw a human outline. They started searching for me in the jungle and in the process they were soon separated from each other in the darkness.
After separating from Capt. Matin; Sayedur Rahman, the Ansar Adjutant, had lost all sense of directions and wandered around in the dark jungle the whole night. He had nothing to eat for two days; water was also scanty in the jungle. His whole body was covered with hundreds of leeches; his clothing, now crimson from the dried blood sipped from the leech-bites; his legs cut in various places by thorns and other sharp objects of the jungle. After sometime, when he felt a little better, we carried him back to the camp in a stretcher.
By now, we were getting extremely worried for Capt. Matin. Some of our religiously oriented comrades had already pledged various sacrifices to ensure the safe return of the .Captain The entire camp was morose; nobody laughed or even talked loudly. Apprehension about Capt. Matin’s fate lingered and made the camp’s air heavy with somberness.
When we were about to give up all hope of the captain’s safe return, when everything seemed lost, on the late afternoon on the fourth day, Capt. Matin finally emerged through the ravine. Everybody became ecstatic; everybody was excitedly shouting and laughing; everybody wanted to touch him; have a glimpse of him. He condition was worse than that of the Adjutant’s. He had a deep gash in his right foot; blood was still dripping from it. All the limbs had various degrees of laceration, some deep cuts and many scratches. His canvas shoes were in tatters and blood was sipping from the wounds. He was so exhausted that the moment he saw us, he collapsed into the ground, unable even to speak properly.
As he was in no condition to walk, somebody managed a bed (khatia) from the coolies and we carried him to our camp in the bed.
It took him full two days to recover enough to describe his part of the incident and we came to know what had happened to him.
We had started running as the Pakistanis started shooting at us, led by the Adjutant and followed by Capt. Matin and I, in that order. He noticed that I was suddenly no longer with them and assumed that I was hit by a bullet and fell down. After crossing the elephant grass–where I had taken shelter—the Adjutant found a forest and had dashed inside it for cover, and the captain followed him.
Soon, however, they got separated in the darkness and completely lost any sense of direction in trying to search for each other in the dark jungle. Thinking that he was heading for the Dhaka-Sylhet road, Capt. Matin had penetrated deep into the forest and spent the entire night wandering in the forest. In the morning he found his way to a teagarden; however, he had no idea which garden it was. He aimlessly moved around the garden trying to find a way out. Later he found an abandoned collie colony and took shelter in one of the huts there for the night. He woke up hungry the next morning and after some desperate search for food, only managed to find a few ripe guavas in the abandoned trees of the collie colony. Having eaten the guavas, he left the coolie colony and entered the teagarden. To obtain a better view of the surrounding areas, he took position on top of a hillock. He was trying to find someone who could direct him to the Bangladesh-India border. The teagarden was deserted and nobody was in sight. Suddenly, he saw a Pakistani patrol of ten soldiers about 400 meters from his location, heading away from him. He followed them from a distance and found that the Pakistanis had a camp on top of a hill. He took position in a nearby hillock overlooking the Pakistanis; there was a road on one side and a 3-feet deep rainwater drain on the other side of the hillock.
In the hillock occupied by the Pakistanis, he could see a baldheaded person taking a bath seated on a wooden stool. Another person was using a huge mug to scoop water from a bucket of water and was pouring it over the baldhead’s body.
Capt. Matin was desperately hoping to find a civilian to inquire the whereabouts of his location. He had no idea where he was. Unfortunately, no civilian was in sight. After waiting for a few hours, he decided to try his luck elsewhere. By now, he was very hungry as he had nothing to eat but the few guavas in the morning.
When he was preparing to leave, he saw a Pakistani patrol—this time coming toward him–from the enemy base, offering an excellent opportunity for an ambush. He position under a shade tree on top of the hillock offered an ideal location to shoot at anybody in the road, which was about 100 meters below the hillock.
The carefree manner by which the enemy patrol was marching suggested that they were not expecting any trouble; most carried the weapons shouldered. They had two LMGs, two SMGs and Chinese rifles. The group was lead by, probably by an NCO carrying a Chinese SMG. As the patrol came in front of the hillock, using the tree both as a cover and as a support for the SMG, he fired a full magazine at the enemy. And as soon as his magazine emptied, he ran down the hillock to the rainwater drain and started running. The unexpected attack had taken the Pakistanis by complete surprise. Bewildered by the attack, the enemy could not fire a single shot until he had started running for the drain. When Capt. Matin heard the sound of enemy’s shooting, he was beyond the enemy’s reach. After sometime, he left the drain and continued wandering aimlessly in the teagarden. At length, the teagarden ended and gave way to some paddy fields. As it was getting dark, he took shelter under a large tree outside the garden and spent the night there. The next morning, desperate to find some food, he ventured by the side of the paddy fields until he spotted a tin-roofed house—an isolated house at a corner of the desolate paddy field with no other houses in the vicinity. He went inside the house and found a middle-aged person attired in a lungi, vest, and a cap. His sub machine gun ready, he told him that he was a member of the Mukti Bahini and requested some food. There was another occupant of the house—a woman—probably the man’s wife. Both of them were very obsequious and immediately caught a chicken, many of which were loitering around the house. Soon, rice and chicken curry were cooked under the watchful eye of the ravenous captain and soon the food was presented to him. Capt. Matin was so hungry that he not only gulped down the food but also failed to notice that the man was no longer around him. It’s only after he had finished his meal with a generous drink of water that he suddenly discovered that the man was nowhere to be seen.around. It seemed the man had fled while he was eating. Alarmed and suspecting foul play, the Captain immediately left the house and hid himself behind a large tree some distance from the house. After about half an hour he saw a group of about 10-12 persons, a few of them in black uniforms and others in khakis, were cautiously approaching the house. He had no doubts that he was betrayed–the man that had fed him also informed the Pakistanis. Capt. Matin was furious at the treachery; angry and determined to teach them a lesson. He allowed them to come within 100 meters and then, from the cover of the tree, unleashed a savage salvo at the enemy. The enemy, who had no cover in the open road. After firing a few bursts, he swiftly ran for the safety of the teagarden, from where he had emerged the previous night. Exhausted by the desperate dash, wilted by inadequate sleep the previous night, and somnolent from a heavy meal, he was now feeling extremely fatigued. Inside the teagarden he selected an isolated tall tree surrounded by bushes and sat under its shade to rest and soon his exhaustion made him surrender to sleep. He woke up when the sun was about to set.
When it grew dark Capt. Matin decided that the teagarden was not a safe place to sleep at night as the garden was infested with deadly snakes and various other nocturnal animals, which ruled the teagarden at night. He decided to sleep outside the teagarden—the same spot where he had taken shelter the previous night.
As he was trying to leave the teagarden, he again lost his directions in the darkness. He continued waking the snaking paths between the hills and after a few hours, again exhausted, he sat down on the road to rest. After sometime, he resumed his nocturnal wandering in the foreboding teagarden. Two of his magazines were already empty and now he was left with only two 30-rounds magazines. He did not dare shoot at anything in fear of attracting enemy’s attention, particularly when he did not even know where he was and whether the enemy was waiting just around the bend. If you wanted to sleep in a jungle in Sylhet, you better find a clearing with sand underneath. Because if you sleep in the vegetation, particularly on grass, a thousand bloodthirsty leeches will soon descend on you and suck you dry without you being aware of it. Capt. Matin found a sandy patch between two hillocks and his exhaustion soon led him to blissful slumber. Anxiety of the unknown made him wake up many times during the night and finally just before daybreak he again started moving. He took position in a nearby hillock, under a tea bush, and kept waiting for someone to arrive. After 2-3 hours, he saw a person dressed in trousers, shirt, and sandals approach the hillock. Very cautiously, using the tea bushes as cover, he approached and grabbed the man—who was completely surprised by being suddenly snatched by a stranger brandishing a menacing SMG. The person appeared quite harmless, but the Captain had learned his lessons. He asked him the name of the teagarden and was told that it was Lalchand teagarden.
When asked, the man told him that his name was Murshed and he was from Chadpur. He also informed Capt. Matin that he was a relative of Khandaker Mushtaq Ahmed, a senior leader of the Bangladesh Government in exile.
Capt. Matin asked him to take him to the border. Murshed hesitated a moment before responding and then inquired if Capt. Matin would like something to eat first. He obviously looked very hungry. Capt. Matin, however, could not completely trust Murshed—a stranger to him and someone who was still working in a teagarden. Murshed suggested that Capt. Matin should eat something to regain his strength and then he would lead him to the Bangladesh-India border. Capt. Matin was hesitating but finally his hunger won over his suspicion. He pointed to the hillock he had descended from and told Murshed that he will be on that hillock waiting for Murshed to come back with some food. Soon Murshed left to fetch some food from his house, which was nearby. Murshed was a junior officer in the teagarden.
Capt. Matin; however, did not take position in the indicated hillock, instead he took position on the hillock immediately opposite the indicated one and waited cautiously for Murshed’s return; ready to dart at any sign of treachery.
After ten minutes he saw Murshed coming back carrying a small jute bag. He approached the hillock where Capt. Matin was supposed to be and started cautiously calling, “Bhai, Bhai, where are you?” The Captain waited for a while, then descended from the hillock; Murshed was surprised to see him come from an unexpected direction.
Murshed had with him some homemade country cakes, which appeared delicious to the famished Captain. Soon he finished eating the meager but welcome food.
After the captain had finished eating the food, Murshed led him through the teagarden and forest to the Dhaka-Sylhet road. Murshed went back to his teagarden and Capt. Matin never met him since. He is ever grateful to the kind person who helped him to come out to safety.
In took about a week before Capt. Matin’s wounds healed adequately and he regained his strength.
Meanwhile, a cow and a goat were sacrificed and we had a feast to celebrate his safe return—quite lavish in those days.
The regular mortar raids and ambushes were becoming commonplace, monotonous, and boring. Our confidence was also higher as we were now generally better trained and had some decent weapons. Therefore, we wanted to expand our horizon and try out something new. The options available to us were raids and frontal attacks. Frontal attack, considering our strength, training, and firepower, was ruled out; leaving raid as the only viable option for further consideration.
We needed a target for the raid and there were a few options: 1) Teliapara Railway Station, or 2) Teliapara teagarden, or 3) Shahpur railway station, or 4) some other location. Since targets 1 through 3 were relatively close to the border, the enemy remained in constant apprehension of an attack and, therefore, it would be impossible for us to obtain the element of surprise, which is important in a raid. We needed to select a location where it would be relatively easy for us to achieve the element of surprise and, therefore, the usual targets had to be ruled our. After some deliberations, we selected Shahjibazar as the target.
Shahjibazar, located in Habiganj, contained a power plant, which provided electricity to a large area in Sylhet. To conduct a raid we needed information about Shahjibazar: the layout of the plant, enemy strength and composition, nearby hiding places, attitude of local people, etc. One member of our company was a former employee of the power plant (before March 71). He gave us valuable information about the plant, particularly the layout and location of transformers; the number of shifts and people per shift; the entrances to the plant; etc. Moreover, just after coming to Simna, we had provided training to a small group of teagarden coolies and equipped them with firearms so that they can assist us in reconnaissance. Being residents of the locality, they had intimate knowledge about the surrounding areas including knowledge of various less known and unknown roads and tracks through the teagardens and forests. This group collected information on enemy movements in the teagardens and surrounding areas and supplied us with information about the enemy. We used them to find a suitable path to Shahjibazar through Raghunandan forest. They came back a few days later and recommended a path through Satchari teagarden; then crossing the Dhaka-Sylhet road; finally, through the forest to a teagarden in Shahjibazar.
Map 1: Map showing the location of Shahjibazar Power Station (top middle of the Map). At the bottom of the map, our Simna base (inIndian territory) and other locations are also clearly marked. The yellow line is the Bangladesh-India Border.
Straight-line distance from Satchari border to Shahjibazar is about 12 miles. The selected route; however, required that first we head northeast through Satchari and then change direction to north-west keeping Deundi and Lalchand teagardens to our left and finally heading west to Shahjibazar Power Station. The total distance of this route was about 20 miles through the jungle and teagardens.
The power station complex was housed in an area of approximately 550 yards by 450 yards rectangular area. The Dhaka-Sylhet railway line ran along the power station. When approached from the railway, which ran along the eastern boundary of the power station, the structure containing the generators was located about 150 yards from the rail line. The transformers were located to the north of the generator house. The area to the north of the complex contained the residential areas of the plant employees. Our main target was the transformers.
About 50 yards from the railway line, a concrete wall topped with a barbed wire fence surrounded the entire complex. To destroy the transformers, first we had to create a passage through the wall, enter the complex, reach the transformers, and destroy them.
The problem was that a number of enemy bunkers and sentry towers secured the power station complex. There were two bunkers facing the railway line, one in front of the generator house and the other at the northeast corner of the complex. The location of other bunkers was at the northwest and the last, on the southwest corner. Four sentry towers, one on each side of the complex protected the complex.
To be successful, we needed to destroy at least three bunkers facing the railway lines and two guard towers—a tall task indeed. We decided to attack from the railway line. Since we had a single rocket launcher, we needed at least another two. We decided to neutralize the towers by LMG fire, and, if necessary, by some additional hits from the rockets. We estimated that about 30 persons should be adequate for the undertaking.
A map of Shahjibazar power station including the surrounding areas was prepared and the former employee of the plant had invaluable contributions in its preparation. Our coolie guides provided the location of thePakistan army defensive positions. We decided to send the coolie patrol back to Shahjibazar to collect additional information and agreed on a date and time for our rendezvous. They left by leaving a guide for us.
As mobility was critical in this raid, we had to travel light. The group was divided into three sections of ten and each section was given two light Machine Guns. We also decided to take the MG42. All other members were equipped with automatics. We carried rations for three days. Also, we did not forget to carry few local long knives (Daos) to make way through the jungle.
It would have been ideal if we could have accomplished our task at night. Crossing the nearly impassable jungle in complete darkness; however, seemed nearly impossible. Therefore, we had to use daylight for trekking through the forest, which was risky because of the risk of being spotted by Pakistani patrols or Bangali collaborators.
We left base before sunrise, crossed the metal road (Old Dhaka-Sylhet Highway) just after sunrise, and entered the almost pathless thick forest. Somehow our guides miraculously managed to lead us through this maze of thorny bushes, elephant grass, trees of all sizes and shapes, and occasional patches of tea bushes. Midway, as everybody became fatigued from the arduous journey, we stopped in a small clearing in the jungle. After resting for about half an hour, we resumed our journey. We reached the end of the jungle and entered a teagarden at around 1:00 p.m.—instead of six hours, it took us eight hours to cross the distance. As it was already midday, we considered it was prudent to remain hidden inside the teagarden until dusk. We sent two scouts to the boundary of the garden to observe for any enemy movements. One of them returned after an hour with our collie patrol. He updated us about the locations of the enemy defenses and estimated strengths. It seemed that a platoon of Pakistani Army (or was it EPCAF?) reinforced by a contingent of Rajakers was guarding Shahjibazar. We were not bothered about Rajakars in a firefight—they mostly fled at the sound of gunfire.
We decided that ten people should remain near the tea bushes and cover our retreat, while the rest will participate in the raid. Our objective was to destroy the transformers, which was located at the center of the plant—about 50 yards from the section of wall through which we planned to enter.
The sky remained overcast since morning with occasional drizzle. After midday the overhead clouds started to grow thicker and blacker and then around 4:00 p.m. it started to rain accompanied by strong gusts. After about an hour, the rain was replaced by light drizzle with a severe thunderstorm. I was very scared sitting under the inadequate protection of the tea bushes while the thunderstorm raged around us. Before it was completely dark, we ate our dry rations, cleaned and checked our weapons, and waited patiently. It continued to rain, alternating between light drizzle and heavy downpour. Thoroughly drenched in rain, we kept shivering in cold in the month of July; though, in the excitement it did not seem to matter.
Our plan was to attack at around 9:00 p.m., and return by the same route we had come, and hoped to reach the border by morning. We knew that we would be relatively safe once we crossed the Dhaka-Sylhet road.
For the attack, besides our personal arms, we had explosives, grenades, and three rocket launchers with adequate number of rocket projectiles.
Around 8:30 p.m., we silently crept to the edge of the tea bushes, just by the railway lines. The area was completely deserted. The bright glow of the power plant was visible even from the jungle. The success of the mission depended largely on our ability to destroy the bunkers. The three persons with the RPGs took positions behind the tea bushes–from where they could shoot at the designated bunkers. Each tower was assigned to a group of five equipped with a LMGs and other automatics. After the rockets hit the bunkers, five persons would charge them and try to lob grenades inside the bunkers. We would use explosives to blow a hole through the wall to enter the plant. Two persons were assigned this responsibility. A section of ten remained as reserves. It was further decided that the center bunker will be attacked first and the other two will discharge their rockets following this cue,. The LMGs will also take cue from the first rocket explosion. I was by the side of Capt. Matin, near the person firing the RPG on the center bunker.
The rockets hit the bunkers almost simultaneously, partly destroying them. Immediately, the LMGs and the MG42 started firing on the towers and we immediately reloaded the rocket launchers. A firefight broke out. The towers were saturated with bullets and soon there was no return fire from the attacked towers. Slinging my SMG, I ran toward the center bunker while others kept shooting at the bunkers with automatics. There was no return fire from them. I signaled them not to shoot me as I sneaked close to the bunker from the corner. I threw a grenade inside the bunker and ducked; the grenade exploded with a laud bang. There was no sound or movement from the bunker; to be sure, I threw a second grenade inside it—this grenade; however, did not explode.
Meanwhile, two persons successfully blew off a section of the wall, and a hole, large enough for a person to wiggle through, was made.
We entered the complex through the hole in the wall and headed toward the transformers, which was just in front of us. However, to our dismay we found it was enclosed in a barbed wire-fence. We did not know about this fence and it must have been added later. Our plan was to destroy the transformer with explosives. Therefore, we immediately changed our plan and decided to use the rocket launcher to destroy the transformer. In fact, we could do that from outside, firing a rocket through the hole created in the wall.
Immediately, we came out of the complex, summoned a rocket launcher, and instructed the operator accordingly.
Meanwhile, a fierce firefight was raging with the other bunkers and towers. Fortunately, most of the enemy fire was ineffective because these bunkers and towers were quite far from us and the angle of fire made it quite difficult to aim directly at us. In any case, bullets were whizzing everywhere, the tracer rounds creating a beautiful kaleidoscope in the dark sky.
Soon the rocket launcher fired; there were about two simultaneous loud booms because the transformer was about 50 yards from the wall. Immediately, the entire area plunged into compete darkness as the main transformer was damaged.
As soon as the transformer was destroyed (or damaged), we all started running toward the safety of the teagarden and soon went deep inside it where our coolie guides were ready to take us back. It took us considerably less time to reach the Dhaka-Sylhet road and the ravine through Satchari teagarden. After reaching the ravine, we decided to wait for daybreak.
We resumed our journey at first light; but when we were midway in the ravine, we heard sound of firing coming from Satchari teagarden. As we moved cautiously toward the garden, the exchanges were intensifying. We came out of the ravine but saw nobody. We could only hear the exchanges between two groups of combatants. It was obvious that one of our patrols was engaged in a firefight with a Pakistani patrol. It was no secret that the Pakistanis would figure out our escape route and it was not unlikely for them to attempt an ambush. To thwart such a threat, Capt. Matin had prearranged an ambush in the same area. Luckily, our patrol had set the ambush before daybreak and caught the Pakistani patrol in an ambush. After listening to the exchanges for sometime, we guessed the location of the enemy. The Pakistanis; however, engrossed in the firefight, did not yet detect us. We could have sneaked in and attack their flanks. The only way we could let the other patrol know about our presence was to open fire on the enemy from our position. Otherwise, we risked being victims of ‘friendly fire.’ We opened fire on the enemy; our combined strength soon overpowered the enemy and forced them to retreat; we came out to safely. We suffered no casualties.
Born for 71 